COMPANY PROFILE: True Grit in a Waterworld

Susan Braund

Petroleum Directory Contributing Writer

John Wayne would have made a great offshore diver. He had the grit and determination it takes to accomplish underwater tasks that would make others fold their cards.

Being a front line diver in Alaska’s Cook Inlet is tough. It requires skill, focus, tolerance for pain and the ability to work adeptly with your hands — in the blind. “It’s a tough profession,” says Offshore Divers co-owner Don Ingraham. “You have to be stubborn with no give … it’s rare to see a diver who will give up … if your tendency is to give in easily you do not belong in this business.”

Ingraham does not hesitate to acknowledge that there are talented women in the business, but few choose to dive in Cook Inlet — mostly, he thinks, because of the weight of the equipment required. “A diver might have 100 pounds of tools,” he says. “The diving hat weighs 30 pounds, then stack on 40 or 50 pounds of tools and add another 30-50 pounds for a weight belt and gravity takes over. A hard thing is making a tough dive and bringing it all back up the dive ladder with the tide running. This is a real hard job, that’s what it amounts to. Few people are cut out for it. Only about one-half percent of graduates from 15 or so diving schools stay in the business.”

The murky waters of Cook Inlet require a highly developed tactile sense. A large portion of the divers’ work is done by feel, almost like a sixth sense. “You learn to rely on your fingers; you get so good at it that when you are in clear water you often will close your eyes for better focus.”

The business

The five-year old diving contractor is co-owned by Don Ingraham and Leif Simcox, who together have 50-plus years of commercial diving experience. In the past the owners have individually worked the North Sea, South America and New Zealand, but all of the company’s work has been in Alaska. They recently bid work in the Sakhalin Islands where diving conditions are very similar.

According to Simcox, 98 percent of the company’s work is oilfield-related: “To get oil work, you need to be known. We have a track record and known divers. Offshore Divers has proven that it can do the work.”

Crew numbers may swell to 30 or 40 during the peak season and balance out at about 15 welders and divers the rest of the year, including six core divers. Leif runs most of the jobs while Don concentrates on running the office and periodically diving some of the shorter jobs.

Few Alaska commercial diving contractors carry the insurance and certifications held by Offshore. “We are an Association of Commercial Diving Contractor member company. All of our divers have ADC credentials.” emphasizes Ingraham. “The proper types and amounts of insurance is a critical credential. Similar to the airlines, since 9-11 insurance rates have soared. Our insurance meets or exceeds the requirements of oil & construction companies and the State of Alaska. The insurance costs mandate a valid and active safety program developed around the regulations of OSHA and the USCG in compliance with the ADC standards.

The Sand Island

Customized for Alaska conditions and diving operations, the Sand Island is work-wise with deep air diving system, heavy duty hydraulic deck crane, deck winch and hydraulic manifold for flow and pressure control for a variety hydraulic tools and saws.

Added specialty equipment includes two differential GPS systems and a Doppler current profiler. “With the GPS, we can be on a pipeline usually in one tide, where in the past it might take three to six tides,” reports Ingraham. “And the current profiler provides current speeds every 10 feet from the surface to the bottom. It supplies valuable information to the diver for starting his dive.”

For its blackwater camera system, the vessel has a multi-stage pump to supply medium pressure fresh water through a camera box for photographing critical structural platform welds in Cook Inlet capturing both still and video pictures.

“Technology has definitely improved efficiency” says Ingraham, “but in the end the diver still must get in the water and produce. That part hasn’t changed much, other than we have better gear.”

Because of its lack of real communications, limited air supply and no tie to the surface, scuba gear is not an approved diving method at Offshore Divers. Scuba gear and training is only for recreation, not working divers, according to Offshore Divers.

Locked and loaded

Last summer it took 89 dives to complete a Cook Inlet subsea pipeline re-abandonment project. The old line corroded and began producing occasional sheens. Offshore Divers provided the diving to sever the line and install a subsea pig launcher. They also installed several subsea hot taps to allow tying the line to surface vacuum trucks for fluid removal. At project completion, the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation and U.S. Coast Guard accepted the line for re-abandonment.

Some of the company’s most hazardous work is yearly maintenance on the deep mooring systems in Valdez and Prince William Sound. Working on these three-legged mammoths in 300-plus feet of water is large scale: manipulating 100-pound-per-link chains and 40,000- pound leg anchors from the decks of a 220-foot work boat using a 150-ton double drum winch is the bulk of the work., then add in an ocean-going landing craft and a 10,000 horsepower tug to the mix. All critical components are regularly changed out to prevent failures which could free 400-foot spill response barges with millions of dollars of spill response equipment and spill response crews on board. “Working these systems requires critical planning and strict safety compliance,” says Ingraham, “It’s all so big and heavy — there’s little room for error, untrained crews or untried methods.”

5630 Silverado Way, Unit A-9

Anchorage, AK 99518

907-563-9060

www.offshoredivers.com

Editor's note: Susan Braund owns Firestar Media Services in Anchorage, Alaska.