Hugh O’Brien – Author of UNDAUNTED- From Clearance Diver to Mercenary

Growing up on the family sheep and wheat farm near Young, New South Wales, Hugh ‘Obi’ O’Brien was the second of four sporty and competitive sons.

Attending Sydney boarding school Saint Joseph‘s College, a Rugby Academy, old school English customs and Dickensian group living honed his fast-developing survival skills.

His lacklustre performance in both sporting and academic endeavours ingrained a sense of underachievement that would fuel his latest success in the special forces.

After high school, Obi attended university somewhat aimlessly. On the advice of his younger brother Phil, a member of the Armed Forces, and an encounter with a friends father who was a clearance diver, he applied for the Navy as a clearance diving candidate and against all odds found success and acceptance with these sub-aquatic supermen.

With an unquenchable thirst for adversity, Obi applied for special forces with the Army’s counterterrorism unit, TAG east, a secretive team of divers and commandos task with defending the domestic population from harm post 9/11.

Admittance to this unit – their failure rate in the 80th percentile – was the defining moment of his life, the chance to serve where angels fear to tread and maybe, just maybe feel worthy of the path less travelled.

In 2007, Hugh left the special forces and has since pursued a career in private security. He continues to seek adventure wherever it may lie, be at pirate hunting in the red sea or mentoring soldiers in Afghanistan. He is currently stationed in Iraq but otherwise lives in Sydney.