Members of the Finnish Coastguard have been training as offshore divers in Lochaber because the courses they needed were not available in Finland.
Six members of the coastguard, along with four commercial divers from Finland, completed the HSE Surface Supplied Top-Up course, as well as a First Aid at Work training course, at The Underwater Centre in Fort William.
The Finnish Coastguard has recently purchased a new dynamic positioning vessel (DPV), which will be multi-purpose, but its operations will mainly involve sea rescue, assisting the police and recovery work.
It will also assist the Finnish Environmental Services in the recovery of fuel from wrecked ships.
There is no formal certification for offshore diving in Finland due to the lack of this type of diving carried out there, but the team was required to have a formal, approved certification so they travelled to Fort William to complete the necessary course at its award-winning subsea training and trials facility.
All experienced commercial divers, the men were already trained to the Finnish equivalent of the HSE surface supplied certification, which is accepted as a pre-requisite for attending the HSE Top-Up course.
Steve Ham, who is general manager at the centre, said: “As demand from industry for our services increases, I am glad that we can deliver great training and deliver a course to meet their requirements.”
He added: “We were impressed with the professionalism of the Finnish divers and look forward to welcoming more of their compatriots in the future.”
Gulf of Finland Coastguard District Diving Officer Arthur Heickell, who works for the Finnish Border Guard, said they were very pleased with the course and thoroughly enjoyed their time at the centre.
He said: “It has been great for the team to have such dedicated training – the training in Finland is significantly longer and the diver training is mixed with other elements, so it’s good to be on a course that is so focused.”
The Underwater Centre in Fort William, and its sister centre in Tasmania, have trained divers from many countries around the world, including Angola, Holland, Russia and Iran.