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At The Underwater Centre, Fort William, training courses cover an extensive range of diving skills, plus ROV piloting and maintenance. Although, during his recent visit, Michael Cocks (right) didn't manage to sample everything on offer, it wasn't for lack of trying ....It is almost a year since I last visited The Underwater Centre at Fort William, so, having recently written about diving schools in America and France, I thought it was time for me to check out a home-based training establishment, which, unlike overseas ones, is regularly visited by HSE inspectors. I have been visiting the Fort William site, on the west coast of Scotland, for more than ten years, and did my Part 1 commercial training there. The changes have been huge since the Stenmar Group - in which my host, Don McGregor, is a major shareholder - took over the centre in 1994. In November 1999, The Underwater Centre brought saturation diver training back to this country at a cost of more than £600,000. £1.5 million 
There is now an excellent dining and relaxing area for the students, further high-standard bedrooms have been built, and additional work is planned on the pier welding bays and workshops. In all, more than £1.5 million has been spent at the centre, which works closely with the local authorities, since 1994.I was particularly pleased to see on this visit three young students, who had been working as non-divers for North Sea diving companies, now doing their air diving courses. It is clear that diving companies are now accepting that they need to introduce more young divers, both to air diving and to saturation diving on the North Sea. I was also pleased to meet Derek Curtis, whose father Tony is a part owner of Sub Aqua Diving Services, with whom I have had a number of political jousting matches. As I say repeatedly, it is vital that newly qualified divers continue their training on site. After my article on the sat school at Marseilles, I was a little apprehensive about what was in store for me. In fact, I had three successful dives. Comfortable 
The first was on scuba wearing an Exo 26 mask. (As I have pointed out in the past, I believe that is it vital that a commercial diver is comfortable in scuba, even if almost all his diving will be done in surface-demand gear.) I then did a free ascent from the wet bell, wearing a band mask, under the eagle eye of my old friend Chris Tatham. Finally, I was taken on the saturation barge and had a shallow lock-out dive under the supervision of Brian Lane, who has started his own website (www.divingpersonnel.com) to help divers get work.My bell partner, Bob Brown, was an equally experienced sat diver and managed to get me out of, and more importantly back into, the bell. I then spent an hour with him in the diver living quarters. My talking 
All the dives were pleasant, but I always feel happy that I can go "home" at the end of a dive and not be locked away for up to 28 days. As I am a compassionate person, I have never felt it right to inflict my talking, albeit with a different sound, for any length of time on my fellow divers.I have always felt it essential that there should be at least one first-class commercial school in the UK - for one short period there were no fewer than seven diver training schools and one government school. 
I was impressed by all the changes at The Underwater Centre. The sun actually shone on two of the days I was there, and I was also pleased to learn that the rest of the Stenmar group has been receiving large orders, particularly from the French navy.Almost all the students I met during my visit were happy to talk to me, and I hope some will keep in touch and ask for help in getting work. It is always good to dive with a student I have seen being trained. I left Fort William better equipped to talk about commercial training in the UK at the International Diving Schools' meeting in Panama City, and I wish all at The Underwater Centre continued success. Tel: +44 (0)1397 703786, Fax: +44 (0)1397 704969, E-mail: tuc@stenmar.com, Web: www.stenmar.com |
© 2001 Underwater World Publications Ltd.