The Unidive club diveboat and boat handlers

The New Boat

"Down Under" is the new UniDive, is a 5.9 metre Swift aluminum hulled rigid inflatable built in July-August 2009. The boat can carry eight divers with two tanks or ten divers on a single tank dive. The boat is powered by a 175 hp Mariner V6 and has a large inboard fuel tank (150 litres, ~6 hr running time).

The Old Boat

Cool Change was the old UniDive club boat and servided the club and its mebers fo many years. It was a 5.9 metre Swift aluminum hulled rigid inflatable built in July 2000. The boat can carry eight divers with two tanks or ten divers on a single tank dive. The boat was powered by a 135 hp Mariner V6 and has a large inboard fuel tank (150 litres, ~6 hr running time).

Towing the Boat

Members wishing to tow the boat currently need to prove their proficiency to the safety committee chair before towing. The boat weighs ~1150 kg empty, so the tow vehicle being used must rated to pull at least 1200 kg. See list of approved boat towers can be found at the end of this page.

Boat handling

Club approved Boat Handlers can take the Unidive boat out on dive trips. As they will be driving the Unidive boat with Unidive gear and members, a lot of responsibility rests on their shoulders. See current list of club approved boat handlers.

Approved Boat Handlers

Club approved boat handlers must have:

  • Queensland Recreational Shipmasters Licence
  • Club-approved boat handling course. This may a commercial course approved by the safety committee or an in-house course
  • Current CPR and O2 qualifications
  • Completed a Form 1 which must be approved by the safety committee

Active boat handlers will be updated annually on O2 and CPR skills.

Approval for boat handling a particular dive site

Before a Boat Handler can take the boat to a particular dive site they need to show proof of experience to that particular dive site or a similar site. Therefore the Boat Handler must have completed and have approved by the safety committee:

Before approval will be given by the safety committee, at each site boat handlers need to prove to the to senior boating officer that they are:

  • Proficient at launching and retrieving the boat
  • Locating and navigating to and from the dive sites
  • Anchoring and retrieving divers from the site
  • Completed a Form 4 certification confirmation at the commencement of each year

Getting experience

Any club member can get more experience driving the boat. However, the member needs to have a Recreational Shipmasters License and be under the supervision of an Club approved Boat Handlers.

Members wanting to become approved Boat Handlers are encouraged to ask to drive the boat at every opportunity and maintain a log of their experience to back up their application to the Safety Committee. Unidive organises training sessions and Recreational Shipmasters License testing sessions.

Boat handler forms and documents:

  • Boat Handler Application: Form 1
  • Boat Handler Site Application: Form 2
  • Boat Handler Site Application: Form 3
  • Boat Handler Annual Certification Confirmation : Form 4
  • Definition of Sites table

Club approved boat handlers

Robin Aurisch, John Holmes, Chris Roelfsema, Maggie Watts, Bruce Mclean, Loch Pollard, Chris Perry, Cas Simons, Gavin Bott, Andy Mason, Kendra Covale, Douglas Stetner, Jeremy Ford, Peter Hwang and Kathy Myers.

The current list of sites and who is approved to boat handle to them is here Current Boat Handlers

Club approved trailer towers

Robin Aurisch, Chris Roelfsema, Chris Perry, John Holmes, Bruce Mclean, Kathy Myers, Jeremy Ford, Peter Hwang, Dave Taylor, Loch Pollard and Douglas Stetner.