BOSSET - Basic Offshore Escape Training, HUET- Helicopter Underwater Escape Training.

If anybody of you guys out there contemplating on working offshore in any of these Oil & gas companies in Malaysia or anywhere around the world, BOSSET, HUET & BASIC FIRE FIGHTING training are a must-to-do before you can go.
The training is a 3-day exercise and it is a must that you pass. The first requirement is knowing how to swim or at least no fear of water, no fear of height and little bit adventurous could be an advantage. The reason why I mentioned that is because the training involves jumping to the water at a height of 15 feet, escaping out from a submerged and overturned helicopter through the windows or doors of a chopper.
The first day, the training involved survival in the open sea - surviving like knowing how to deploy the life raft from the helicopter or boat, jumping into it, and floating yourself and your friends together eating & drinking a meagre ration provided in the life raft for days until help come......if ever be. You also know how to deploy smoke signal and flares to attract attention of a passing ship or plane. You should know how to upright an overturned life raft. Included in the first day is the jumping out from a 15-foot platform to the sea and survive.
Second day is the HUET. We did 5 exercises. One of the hardest training because you need to escape from an overturned helicopter through the door or the window. I have done this training many times (maybe 12 times in my life since I started working offshore) but the recent one I attended with CONSIST, in Ulu Klang was something new because we needed to don a re-breather suit to escape. This re-breather is actually a breathing apparatus which we can breath or recycle our breathed out air a few times in hope to prolong our breathing capabilities when under water. It actually worked.
Third day.....easy. We began the fire fighting training by entering and escaping from a very-very dark building that we did not have any clue what's inside or the features. It was totally dark could not see a thing. There were small table, tunnels, small ladder, obstacles of knee high and the only thing we could move forward was by touching the walls as a guide. Then we learned about the chemistry of fire, fire triangle, different types of fire and the types of fire extinguishers to use.
All in all the training was fun but at the same time my 55-year old muscles were tested to the limit especially on scrambing the safety net.
HUET was a fear factor kind of experience.