November 2008 Vol. 63 No. 11

The Mears Training and Research Facility is adding training for personnel operating horizontal directional drilling (HDD) equipment and a program to certify HDD equipment following maintenance. The HDD training program for Mears employees will cover all aspects of operation of the equipment they will be using, from rig up to rig down, including operation of drilling fluid systems, said Kevin Parker, Mears director of safety training environment compliance.

As is the case with all national disasters, immediately following Hurricane Ike's devastation of the United States Gulf Coast last September, much of the equipment used by emergency crews, including utilities, immediately following the storm was rented.

The Occupational Safety & Health Administration (OSHA) has given verbal assurance to NASSCO that it will continue to consider the sewer rehabilitation work typically performed by its members as "maintenance" rather than "construction" as had been proposed in a rule change to OSHA's confined space standard, reports Irv Gemora, executive director of NASSCO.

There's no single solution to solving current and future workforce shortages of construction workers. Organizations usually must consider several options to address their individual situations.

At 260 miles long, Arizona’s Phoenix Expansion Project is a giant in the making.

Meandering through New Hampshire’s White Mountains, a large wooden penstock pipeline served as the main water supply for a local hydro facility, Jackman Station.

When a friend told Laura Placht that she’d be perfect for sanitary and storm inspection, it was beyond anything the former church secretary ever imagined as a second career.

Global Pipeline Partners LLC, (GPP) recently completed two pipelines running through Wisconsin which comprise the single largest pipeline construction project ever done in the state under one contract.

Ritchie Bros. Auctioneers, the world’s largest auctioneer of industrial equipment, has rolled out an industry-first - a free online wiki for the equipment industry at www.RitchieWiki.com. Using the software provided by Wikipedia, Ritchie Bros. has created a one-stop public resource for equipment information, one that the community at large can research, read, add to and edit.

The federal pipeline regulatory agency proposed a broad new rule which would force hazardous liquid, transmission and distribution pipelines plus LNG terminals to train and test large numbers of employees in control room operations, and implement new safety measures for SCADA systems.

FERC officials say they aren’t pressuring the competing Denali and TransCanada Alaskan pipeline projects to merge. But the two projects – one already in the pre filing process – are heading toward submitting construction applications to FERC at roughly the same time in 2011 or 2012, depending on who one talks to, in what would be a regulatory clash and crash that the agency hopes to avoid. Congress is also pressuring the two Alaskan gas transportation contestants, though very subtly.

A Senate committee’s passage of an important water infrastructure bill at the end of September was encouraging, but unfortunately not decisive.

Subsurface Instruments Inc. has introduced the Inspector 07, a lightweight, handheld instrument for locating buried utilities and other objects.

I will never know precisely what was on my grandfather’s mind that day in 1908 when he decided it was time for a career change.

As turmoil continues to grip the world’s stock markets and traders seem to have a knee-jerk reaction every time some CEO goes to the bathroom, there is a bright side.

Nearly 90 attendees and their guests gathered to hear Mark D. Hall, P.E. director of the Project Engineering and Review Division, in Project Finance and Construction Assistance (PFCA) at the Texas Water Development Board (TWDB), Houston, TX, speak at the Aug. 13 Gulf Coast Trenchless Association meeting held at the Houston Engineering and Scientific Society Building.