Gordon Avery Underwater World Record

About September/October 1963, Maurice Selle and Gordon Avery attempted to set a world record for the longest time underwater. Gordon and Maurice sat in a tank on ‘The Flat’ and breathed air through a pipe, called a hookah, and were reported to have eaten boiled eggs for sustenance. Gordon’s son recalls they stayed submerged for 24 hours.

Gordon Avery and Maurice Selle were submerged in a tank of water setting a world record for the longest time underwater. Reg Francis, Maurice Selle and Gordon Avery. (LHS photo 021L)

Sept/Oct 1963, (L-R) Hazel Tune (Miss Victoria entrant), Gordon Avery, Maurice Selle, Reg Francis, Ron Todd. (LHS photo 022L)

Maurice Selle, a ski instructor who played a key role in establishing Buller’s first ski patrol in 1949. Gordon Avery was a Lorne local, who originally hailed from England, was an abalone diver. Gordon met Dorothy Caird when she worked at the Co-op and later married and lived on Howard Street. Gordon was said to be a “quite a lad” whose speciality was fishing and diving for abalone around King Island.

Sources:

• Surf Coast Times, Committee for Lorne page, article by John Agar, 9 January 2026
• Lorne Historical Society
• Lorne A Living History by Doug Stirling