There are some advantages to training with a London Dive Club with direct access to the River Thames. Our Rhib ‘Femti’ is stored on the river bank and with a short dive to Putney Embankment we’re off! Normally you’ll be doing manoeuvres between Putney and Greenwich and passing all the sights that the River Thames has to offer.
Putney’s BSAC’s Boat Handling course is great fun and is ideal for anyone wanting to learn about rigid-hulled inflatable boats (RIBs) and how to drive them.
It’s a practical boat-based course that gives each student plenty of time at the helm of a small dive boat to practise their skills, including how to drop and recover divers safely.
You will be out and about in boats on both days of this two-day course, which includes a mix of four theory, two dry practical and three open-water practical sessions aboard a RIB. You will learn about the responsibilities of owning, towing and driving a boat, and how to launch and recover it.
With a maximum of three students per instructor in sessions on the water, you will learn how to drive the boat and will have plenty of hands-on time to practise a range of boat manoeuvres to improve your boat-handling skills and safely drop off and recover divers on a dive site.
Practical skills include high-speed driving, slow-speed manoeuvring, anchoring and coming alongside. You will develop your overall seamanship skills, including voyage planning, essential rules of the road and learn the actions to take in an emergency.
A Boat Handler is defined as someone who is:
- Aware of their responsibilities.
- Able to voyage plan considering weather, tides and local area.
- Able to prepare, launch and recover a small boat.
- Competent to drive a boat safely while conducting diving operations.
- Able to safely drop and recover divers at a dive site.
Why not join our club and sign up to your boat handling course!