Year: 2020

The Deepwater Horizon disaster is one of those events you do not forget, especially if you live along the Gulf Coast. For Hiller, it is particularly memorable because of the part we played in servicing the offshore supply ship, the Damon B. Bankston, whose crew was instrumental in rescuing workers from the rig.

In September 2009, the Deepwater Horizon rig drilled the deepest oil well in history at a depth of 35,050 feet approximately 50 miles off the Louisiana coast. On April 20, 2010, a blowout caused an explosion on the rig that killed 11 crewmen and ignited a fireball visible from 40 miles away. The fire was inextinguishable and two days later, the Horizon sank. This left the well gushing at the seabed causing the largest marine oil spill in history.

On offshore rigs, there is typically a supply ship in the vicinity. In this case, the Bankston was tethered to the Deepwater Horizon waiting for drilling mud to be transferred from the rig. Crew members on the Bankston realized something was wrong when they heard the rumbling sound of methane gas and crude oil shooting up the well bore and through the rig’s riser and then the sound of the explosion.

As soon as they realized what was going on, the Bankston crew sprang into action retrieving workers who had jumped into the Gulf of Mexico from the rig to escape the fire. The crew helped rescue 115 survivors that day.

Hiller New Orleans General Manager Mike Charleville and Project Manager Chris Krider remember that time like it was yesterday.

“I came on as a service tech about one week after the accident,” Krider said. “One of my first jobs was to go down with a lead tech and do inspection and maintenance to make sure there was no damage since the vessel was so close to the rig when it exploded. I will never forget it.”

Charleville said the event was one of the most memorable of his 40-plus years with Hiller.

“That disaster will stand out forever in my career,” he said. “And ten years later, we are still seeing the impact. The area west of the Mississippi is still seeing its fishing impacted. Flounder are just starting to come back, and you still can’t catch Speckled Trout like you could before this. It was a terrible accident. Just terrible.”

Built in 2002, the Bankston was designed with Hiller-installed CO2 and detection systems. We have done the majority of service for maintenance and inspections since then.

“There is a sense of pride in knowing that we had a part in protecting the crew on the Bankston,” Charleville said. “It’s always a good feeling to know that you are able to protect people during the most dangerous circumstances.”

“We are in the business of installing systems we hope are never used,” Krider noted adding that when you work offshore, there is nowhere else to go. “When you need them, they have to work. And crews on ships like the Bankston need the peace of mind in knowing they can safely perform their duties.”

The Hiller Companies historically has had a strong relationship with the U.S. military. That relationship continues with our project at Edwards Air Force Base in California building four relocatable, membrane aircraft hangars alongside Cocoon Inc. These portable aircraft hangars are less expensive, take less time to build and can be relocated at a price significantly lower than a new build which makes the Hiller/Cocoon partnership and offerings appealing to the military.

“This venture is a part of our 1Hiller collaboration between our branches across the country,” Hiller Fire Protection New England General Manager Jeffrey Kidd said. “Because of the location of Edwards, it made sense to partner with American Fire Equipment, our division in Arizona, for this project. When we facilitate a project from start to finish, we are able to streamline and offer better pricing than we could with subcontractors, which makes our packages more appealing. We are starting to reap the fruits of intercompany partnerships with our growth and expansion over the last few years.”

Kidd said that partnering with other Hiller branches on projects like this one allows Hiller broader offerings across the country than one branch can offer and makes for a smoother process for clients.

“We bring together turnkey solutions which include many of our disciplines – fire alarms, mass notification, fire sprinklers, foam, fire supplies, etc.,” he said. “We create one package with one price under the fire protection umbrella. We engineer each solution before we bring it to a customer. I don’t like guessing, so we do a lot of upfront work so that we know when we bring it to fruition, it will work and meet codes.”

The Edwards AFB project includes building four aircraft hangars – two for B-52s and two for autonomous drones. The first two hangars, already constructed, house the B-52s that are a part of the AGM-183A Air-Launched Rapid Response Weapon (ARRW) program. This program is a rapid prototyping project aimed at delivering a conventional hypersonic weapons capability to the Warfighter in the early 2020s. The weapon system is designed to provide combatant commanders the capability to destroy high-value, time-sensitive targets. The final captive-carry test for this hypersonic weapon was conducted off the Southern California coast on August 8th.

“This is a major milestone for the program, the team and our Air Force,” Brigadier General Heath Collins, Air Force Program Executive Officer for Weapons said in a press release. “ARRW is the first step in bringing game-changing hypersonic capabilities to our Warfighters.”

Each of the first two hangars took about 18 months to complete. This is half the time it takes to build a hard side hangar. The second two hangars will house autonomous drones and present a unique challenge because cranes must be suspended from the ceiling to accommodate the drones. The third hangar is almost complete and will be finished in record time. The fourth hangar is ready to begin construction as soon as the foundation is ready.

“With government contracts, there is a greater sense of urgency,” Kidd said. “The Cocoon/Hiller partnership was the best option for this and other military projects because we appreciate the speed with which the military needs to get things done, and we have a unique offerings that can meet that need. The military is the bloodline of what we do.”

Kidd looks forward to continuing to grow Hiller’s relationship with the military.

“We are seeing interest from other Air Force groups,” Kidd said. “Because of the quality of our work, because of our dedication to staying on budget and completing jobs on time, because of the quick turnaround and the ability to relocate these hangars in the case of base closings, we expect Hiller will have a bright future on many more projects.”

American Fire Equipment (AFE) holds the unique honor of housing the only mining department in all of The Hiller Companies’ divisions or branches. And according to Mining Division Manager Dave Walters, the men and women in his department should be celebrated as warriors in the fire protection industry.

“These are the men and women who are dedicated to their jobs, to the safety of the miners they work with and the equipment the miners use,” Walters said. “When you consider the risk, the pressure and the conditions our people face every day on the job, they are definitely unsung heroes.”

The mining department is spread out across Arizona and New Mexico and supports copper mines.  The three main groups within the mining division include mines with permanent people, vehicle system technicians and roving technicians. At any given time, there can be as many as 1,000 to 1,500 people working the mines.

Walters said that the mines AFE services are as far as five hours outside of the home office in Phoenix, Arizona. Often, his miners (though they work in fire protection, they are also called miners) are away from home five days per week. The first steps out of their trucks are usually into mud, and the work is normally outdoors. Mining does not stop due to heat or rain, snow or inclement weather.

The mines operate 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year. Equipment only goes down for repairs or refueling. Most systems AFE works on are critical to mining operations, and failures could cost millions of dollars. For example, a fire on a conveyor or an electrical building may cause substantial loss of revenue as certain areas of the mine may not be able to operate. Every piece of equipment undergoes a pre-operation inspection, and most can’t be operated if there is anything wrong with the fire suppression systems.

Add to this the risk of human loss, and you have a recipe for stress. Donald Medina, a mining tech at the Safford, Arizona mine with three years at AFE, has learned to cope with the stress.

“When you first start this kind of job, there is enormous focus on the risk and the life and death of it.,” Medina said. “You learn not to focus so much on that part and just focus on what you have to do. Check the lists. Do the job. If you think too much about it, it can keep you from being able to do the job well. But on the other side, you have to fight complacency. It can become routine, and you aren’t focused enough. You have to find the balance of keeping it all in perspective – focusing on the risk but not to the point that you let it affect your ability to do the job. I think I have that balance now, but sometimes when you start a new project you have to tweak that. The ramifications are so huge – from life and death to making sure you don’t lose a contract that is in the millions of dollars.”

Medina is permanently stationed at the Safford mine, an open-pit copper mine and is responsible for maintaining fire extinguishers as well as inspecting and servicing vehicles and buildings.

Robert Swain relates to the pressure Medina expressed.

“I do the best job I can. I know everyone here. We all grew up together and are friends,” Swain said. “I do my best to keep systems up and running and make sure everyone is safe.”

Swain is a fire systems repair technician with nearly ten years at AFE and is permanently stationed at the Bagdad, Arizona mine. His responsibilities include maintaining fire suppression systems on all equipment at the mine as well as fire extinguishers. If he finds a deficiency, he fixes it on the spot.

This stress also weighs on the mind of Mike Lyon, Vehicle Systems Superintendent with 14 years at AFE.

“If I send someone to a mine, I want to know they made it home safely,” Lyon said. “What we do is possibly saving a life, and it can also be saving multi-million dollar equipment.”

Lyon has been in the mining department since the beginning and helped to set the standards used in the mines today. He manages a 6-member team to make sure all safety requirements are accounted for, schedules are met, proposals are created and installs are scheduled.

“The pressure is there,” he said. “In 14 years, I have seen fires happen. And customers will call and say that their guy got out okay. That means our system worked and did what it was supposed to do. You don’t want to see accidents or injuries, but when fire does happen, you want to know your systems did what they were intended to do. That is the satisfaction of a job done right.”

So with this level of pressure and with this kind of risk, why do miners for AFE do what they do?

It comes down to goals, a desire to support family and a love of what they do.

“Why else would you do this job?” Medina asked. “It’s all about taking care of your family. Why else would you get up every day at 4:00 am and go to a job where the potential to be crushed by 400 tons is always there?”

Medina, Lyon and Swain all agree that you have to love it to do this kind of work. They all have a love of mining – from the process to the results and from the people to the locations. They all also expressed that AFE offers them support, opportunity for advancement and a work family they can count on.

“It’s a unique life, working the mines,” Walters said. “And without the team we have at AFE, we couldn’t do it. There is a lot of responsibility at every level, but there is also a lot of reward when you know the job you have done protects the people and property you are responsible for.”

Since its founding in 1964, Advanced Safety Systems Integrators (A.S.S.I.) has established a proven track record of innovation, reliability and solutions-based service. Looking to 2020 and beyond, A.S.S.I. plans to continue its role in finding creative solutions for challenging problems in the industry.

“We have been in business for more than 50 years,” A.S.S.I. Vice President and General Manager William MacKay said. “The fire protection industry as we know it today is not that old. Aside from water and sprinkler systems, many of the products we use today such as dry chemicals, clean agent systems, advanced smoke detection technologies and water mist extinguishing systems have been developed within the last 25 years. And what makes us different is that we have been among the first in the industry to combine many of these technologies to give our customers the best level of protection technology can provide.”

MacKay notes that A.S.S.I. installed the first Halon 1301 system in a computer room at Harvard University in 1967. Halon was not used in fire protection until the 1960s. MacKay’s father, who founded the company, was a part of the group that pioneered the idea, design and application working with Dupont who was making Halon, and with Fenwal, the equipment manufacturer.

“My father was on the forefront of cutting-edge technology,” MacKay said. “And I have been lucky to have learned from him along the ride.”

A.S.S.I. was involved in the early design of VESDA (Very Early Smoke Detection Apparatus) which was an effective technology for clean rooms and an effective detector for special hazards. They were also the first North American distributor of Marioff HI_FOG® water mist systems which opened the door to using water mist for cultural buildings, historical documents, irreplaceable artifacts and museums.

“This history of innovation gives us a depth of knowledge in products and design that is second-to-none,” MacKay said. “It speaks to the core of our business which is to produce special hazard fire protection solutions focused on the customer’s needs.”

Chief Operating Officer Bill Card added that the combination of leading-edge technology and an experienced team has contributed to the success of A.S.S.I.

“We have a very tenured team here. From Bill MacKay and our technicians to engineers and office staff, many have been here 10, 20, 30 or 40+ years. We have retained employees because we remain focused on great service and delivering exceptional product solution while taking care of our customers and employees.”

Card looks forward to continued growth in the market with support from The Hiller Companies, Inc, who acquired A.S.S.I in 2017.

“Hiller has provided strong executive leadership with deep roots in the fire protection industry,” he said. “There are still a lot of opportunities out there, and with Hiller, we know we have support when we need it; from the assessment of strategic growth opportunities to tactical execution assistance, we can count on The Hiller Companies.”

MacKay appreciates the benefits Hiller has brought to A.S.S.I. as well.

“The biggest benefit of working with Hiller is that we have broadened our area of experience by having an extensive, nation-wide network whose expertise we can draw on going forward,” MacKay said.

The future looks promising for A.S.S.I as it continues to pursue growth by staying true to its roots in special hazard fire protection, but also while looking for ways to expand in the market.

“What’s exciting for us going into the next year and beyond, is fire protection for the lithium-ion battery storage market,” MacKay said. “We see a big need for that, and we have our toes in the water. It is something we look forward to. A.S.S.I. is always looking for the next application. We are experts at designing fire protection solutions using state-of-the-art technologies and applying them to unique and unconventional hazards. The result is a well-engineered and quality fire protection system for the customer.”

Card looks forward to continuing to find market segments that align with A.S.S.I.’s business goals.

“ASSI has a history of delivering innovative fire protection solutions, but we are also known for our loyalty to the manufactures we have aligned with and to our customer base. Over the years, we have worked with small regional firms to Fortune 50 companies. Regardless of the business size, our goal is the same – we want to earn the trust of our clients, maintain long-term relationships and keep them as customers for life,” Card said.