Rear Admiral Ronald Maxwell Hancock

Ronald 'Max' Hancock was born on 27 August 1956. Following schooling in Victoria and Queensland, he joined the RAN in 1972, entering the Royal Australian Naval College. He graduated as a Seaman Officer in 1976 and spent the majority of his junior officer time at sea. In 1983 he attended the Royal Navy Principal Warfare Officer’s course in the United Kingdom, training as a specialist Anti Submarine Warfare Officer. A number of appointments to major combatants followed this training, including two years as the Operations Officer of a Royal Navy frigate in the Arabian Gulf during the Iran-Iraq war and as the Executive Officer in HMAS Derwent. His seagoing career highlights include two ship commands - HMAS Buccaneer, a patrol boat, and HMAS Melbourne, a guided missile frigate, and then Group Command as Commodore Flotillas.

Senior Staff position highlights included three years at HMAS Watson involved in tactical development, warfare officer training and ship command team training, and the Naval Warfare Training Centre Project. He has also held the positions of the Director Naval Personnel Management, the Director Warfare Policy Doctrine - Navy in Navy Headquarters, and in August 1999 as Chief Staff Officer to Chief of Navy.

In December 2000 he was appointed as Deputy Maritime Commander and Chief of Staff and promoted to the rank of Commodore. This was followed in January 2002 with his appointment as Commodore Flotillas. Promoted to Rear Admiral, he was appointed as Director General Coastwatch in June 2002.

In 2004 he became the Deputy Chief of Navy and retired from the RAN in 2006. He was made a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) on 12 June 2006 for exceptional service to the RAN as Director General Coastwatch and Deputy Chief of Navy.