Q. What do you most want people to know about your company?
A. Global Diving & Salvage is the largest diving contractor on the West Coast of the United States, a leading provider of marine construction and infrastructure support services in the United States, and an internationally recognized marine casualty responder. We are one of the few full-service underwater marine contractors that can provide project management, commercial diving, and a full spectrum of environmental services. We do this through six operating divisions: Regional Diving Services, Marine Construction, Casualty Response, Offshore Support Services, ROV Services, and Environmental Services.
Q. Where is your company located?
A. Our corporate headquarters are located in Seattle, WA. Regional offices are in Rio Vista, CA; Richmond, CA; and Global Offshore Divers, Anchorage, AK. We will also be adding a full time business development position to represent us in the Gulf of Mexico this year.
Q. What year was the company founded?
A. Global Diving & Salvage, Inc. was founded by seven divers in 1979 and incorporated in 1980.
Q. Who heads up your company and who is on its senior management team?
A. Our two owners, Tim Beaver and John Graham, stepped down last year from active management to sit on the Board of Directors. Devon Grennan, president, runs the senior management, sits on the board of directors, and still oversees daily operations. Our senior management team comprises of Trinity Ng-Yeung, David DeVilbiss, Mike Langen, Bruce Humberstone and Dan Pierson.
Q. What is the company’s primary business sector?
A. The primary business sector of Global’s Alaska office is the offshore industry. We offer regional diving and environmental services in Alaska, California, and the Pacific Northwest; marine construction support services, project management and engineering; International marine casualty response services, International offshore and oilfield support services; and International ROV services, and Environmental product sales and services.
Q. Are there important projects the company is currently a part of or has done recently?
A. The Port of Anchorage Pile Repair, where we cleaned damaged steel piling with high-pressure water blasting, installed steel jackets and grouted in place. Deep-water recovery of a fuel-laden tanker truck with a container of assorted oils from the waters of the Robson Bight Ecological Reserve. NYDEP DEL 185 - Saturation dive project to provide nondestructive testing, selective demolition, and construction support in 685 feet of water. M/V Monarch Defueling - Successful fuel recovery from a 166-foot offshore supply vessel submerged at the base of an oil platform in Cook Inlet during January 2009.
Q. How many employees does your company have?
A. We have approximately 350 personnel.
Q. Describe the equipment your company might use and whether any new purchases are planned?
A. In the past few years we have acquired multiple large assets including two new saturation dive systems capable of diving to 1000 feet, and several ROVs including a Saab Sea Eye work-class ROV capable of diving to 6000 feet.
Q. Is your company expanding any of its operations or locations?
A. We have recently opened a fully staffed office in Anchorage, AK; and offer our full line of capabilities through that office. In addition, we are opening an office in Richmond, CA; and establishing more of a presence in the Gulf of Mexico Region.
Q. Is the company changing any of its services?
A. Our ROV division provides underwater hydrography services as well as underwater navigation. These technologies are mostly acoustically based and greatly increase the safety and production of diving and ROV work.
Q. What is your company’s main strength or its edge over the competition?
A. Our main strength is our commitment to employee safety and customer satisfaction. We work hand in hand with clients to create unique solutions. Where we really stand out is on technically challenging projects, providing strong engineering support in-house and approaching projects with a team concept, where we utilize the abilities of the entire company to complete complex projects that have not been done before.
Q. What new markets, clients or projects did your company attract in the last year?
A. The increased abilities of our ROV division have opened the door for deep-water salvage projects beyond the range of human diving.
Q. What is the most challenging job the company has undertaken?
A. It is difficult to pinpoint the most challenging project we have ever undertaken. By nature of what we do and who we are, nearly half of our jobs are very challenging from a technical level. One of the more complex projects that we underwent recently was the saturation diving project recently completed in New York in nearly 700 feet of water. There was very limited access into the 13-foot-diameter shaft, and special equipment and procedures had to be developed and built in order to complete the job. Loading commercial dive gear in a Cessna 210 and conducting a dive safely off the floats in a very remote part of Alaska can in some ways be just as challenging as the project in New York.
Q. What are the biggest obstacles to completing work the company undertakes?
A. We have a unique niche market that few people understand, so we commit significant energy to educating our clients and potential clients about the diving industry. As a part of that effort, we sit on the Board of Directors for the Association of Diving Contractors and the American Salvage Association.
Q. What do you see as your company’s biggest challenge in the next five years?
A. To properly position ourselves to be prepared to meet our client’s needs in changing markets and economies.
Q. What do you see as future trends or opportunities for your company from events such as long-term weather fluctuations?
A. Our nation’s infrastructure is aging and with that comes maintenance that can no longer be delayed on civil works projects. Our nation’s oilfields are also aging, so we are ensuring we are properly positioned to expand our commitment to the offshore and oilfield service support industries.
Q. Does your company have an anniversary or other landmark event coming up?
A. We just celebrated our 30th anniversary as a whole and our one-year anniversary with our Alaska Office, regionally known as Global Offshore Divers.
Q. What is the average length of time employee’s work for the company?
A. Most of our senior management team and senior divers have been with us for over fifteen years.
Q. What is your company’s safety record? What steps does the company take to ensure a safe work environment?
A. We maintain a great safety record by taking pro-active and preventative steps to ensure a safe work environment for our employees and third parties on our job sites. Our employees play an important role in helping develop and roll out our safety program, policies, and procedures. Each project is approached from a safety standpoint.
Q. Has your company received any awards or recognition?
A. Global received recognition from Chevron MCA last year for 3 years of Incident Free Operations.
Q. Has your company been involved in any community projects or charities events?
A. We have started hosting a benefit golf tournament each year. The first three tournaments were for the Puget Sound Maritime Historical Society; the 2010 tournament will be for the Seattle Children’s Hospital. Average contributed donations from the tournament are around $28,000 each year. Global supports the Anchorage Zoo and several Anchorage based charitable organizations. Global also supports the Seattle Children’s Hospital through participation in Team Seattle at the 24-hour Daytona www.teamseattle.com. Please visit this Web site if you are interested in participating. Global Diving offers a matching policy for employees who wish to contribute to charitable organizations.
Q. Does your company have a Web site?
A. We just launched a new Web site: www.gdiving.com.
