Navy People: Ashley Semmens

27 July 2010

Seaford-raised Ashley Semmens, 26, loved swimming competitively and as a teenager was aiming for the Olympics.

But after trials for the 2004 Games, Ashley had a change of heart and chose a career as a Navy clearance diver, the Navy’s SAS.

Ashley joined the Navy in 2005. He’s still surrounded by water much of the time, but he’s also gaining skills in the specialised area of explosive ordnance disposal.

For the next few weeks Ashley will be in Hawaii as part of Exercise RIMPAC. It’s the largest maritime exercise in the Pacific and involves 14 Pacific Rim nations.

“It’s been good to meet divers from other countries and have exposure to the way they do things,” Ashley said.

Located at Hickam Air Force Base, adjacent to Pearl Harbor Naval Base, Ashley and his Dive Team members are surrounded by significant World War 2 history – which has provided the divers with unique opportunities.

The Aussie divers have already had a tour of USS Missouri, the highly decorated warship that fought from the Pacific theatre right up to Operation Desert Storm. It is now a museum ship at Pearl Harbor.

“We did a tour of USS Missouri — an amazing experience. The whole history on it was impressive,” Ashley said.

“We then dived for about 45 minutes. Considering the significance of the ship, it was a really unique dive.”

Using the sites that the island of Oahu has on offer, the divers training has ranged from diving at Shark Cove to getting up the Golden Staircase in Kaneohe Bay – a total of 3922 steps to the top of a volcano.

Ashley said that having a background in fitness has helped him with some of the physical demands of the job. Having a Dad in the Navy also helped show the way. Father Terry was Boatswain’s Mate, an expert in on-deck seamanship.