ISSA Offshore Skipper Student Textbook

The ISSA Yacht Master Offshore is a course aimed at candidates who have completed the ISSA Offshore Skipper Course and have gained years of sailing experience(2800NM). The aim of the course is to increase the candidates’ nautical knowledge to competently take on the duties of a YMO on board a yacht – in daylight hours, at night, in busy sea lanes, or over 150NM offshore.

The ISSA Yacht Master Student Handbook has been put together to ensure prospective students have access to a text with good illustrations, that concisely and accurately represents the knowledge and skills required to participate in this very high level qualification. This comprehensive, high level, shore based and sea based course, includes assessment papers and written examinations.

Candidates are advised that a considerable amount of private study and varied cruising experience is required in addition to the formal instruction provided. We strongly advise you to sign up at least 3 months in advance so we can send you our course notes handbook, for revision purposes. (In two weeks it is impossible to cover everything that a Yacht Master should know, understand and be capable of practising). The handbook we provide condenses much of the knowledge required for a YMO aspirant student. YMO’s have a good understanding of sailing / boat handling, nautical terminology and safety at sea. This is a course for recreational and aspiring commercial skippers.  Check out the syllabus and some of the downloads for YMO on this link.

On this important Safety Course we teach students to use a vhf radio to transmit a Mayday, make Urgency Calls, act as a Mayday Relay and learn and understand radio protocol and the use of the radio procedure. We teach you about Search and Rescue protocol and your obligations and imperatives when responding to distress or urgency calls. We teach you to use a radio for everyday communication and for those situations where lives depend on your relay skills.

Students wishing to become  RIB Skippers, ISSA Instructors, Inshore/Offshore Skippers or Yacht Masters, must have completed a VHF Radio course* and students wishing to participate in MOY 200 tons courses must also have this qualification.

This fifth edition of CEVNI brings together the best practices from the existing traffic regulations of the river commissions and UNECE member States. The new edition updates existing regulations including: the rules of the road, the berthing rules, provisions for small craft, Inland Automatic Identification System (AIS), prevention of pollution of water, as well as introducing a new Annex on a Safety checklist for bunkering fuel.

Our handbook clearly illustrates the rules for inland waterways and the necessity for recreational sailors to have a working knowledge of the rules and have passed the CEVNI Test that is required to use the waterways in Europe.

The Keelboat Crew Handbook is the starter course for absolute beginners and the content is aimed at novice sailors. Safety is our primary concern and is carefully covered in this handbook. The syllabus covers the following topics in carefully illustrated and concisely written notes making the series of three books very useful for the modern keelboat sailor. The handbook covers the following subjects for aspiring Keelboat Crew;

• Safety
• Parts of a boat
• Boat handling under sail and power
• Berthing basics
• Tides and currents
• Simple weather
• IALA buoyage
• Sail trim
• Outboard engines
• Folding sails
• Basic knots
• Environmental considerations

The course is 90% practical and is assessed on water. This is a fun course and the handbook is designed with this in mind.