Falck Alford

Safety first

Operating as part of the Falck group, Falck Alford was founded in the US in 1996 as an inspection business.

The Louisianabased company’s activities have since expanded and it now provides a range of safety training and construction support services for the oil and gas industry in the Gulf of Mexico. It offers over 60 types of safety and maritime training classes, including fire fighting, offshore water survival, confined space rescue, crane operation and rigging, respirator fitting, electrical safety and OSHA. Additionally, it supplies and rents safety equipment, inspectors, paramedics, EMTs, confined space teams, rescue teams, clerks and fire watch personnel.

Falck Alford is also responsible for developing a new safe welding enclosure designed to eliminate shut-in time for projects, maintenance and repairs. Labelled HAZTEC, which stands for Hazardous Atmospheric Zone Telemetry for Environmental Control, it creates an isolated safe zone around the work area, allowing hot work to take place in a situation where it would have been otherwise impossible. All enclosures are custom designed to fit each particular situation without disrupting or altering the area, or any existing equipment.

International business development director at Falck Alford, Todd Hutchinson, discusses some of the benefits of HAZTEC: “In the Gulf of Mexico there are laws stating that welding cannot take place within ten feetof any production process equipment. This means that oil companies would have to shut in their process whilst conducting any repairs or maintenance. Consequently they not only stand to lose revenues, but also run the risk of hampering some of their drilling programmes, because once you shut in a well, you can never be 100 per cent certain you will get it back. What we have done is enabled the operators to stay on stream whilst making upgrades upon their oil platforms.”

The HAZTEC is built using fire-retardant wood, and each element is constructed according to both OSHA and MMS guidelines and directives. A fire-resistant blanket also lines the floor of the enclosure, whereas a layer of light-gauge stainless steel dissipates heat by dispersing slag and sparks. All openings of the enclosure are sealed, filtered or closed to create a positive pressure, whilst also protecting the inside atmosphere from exposure to potential dangers from outside. Furthermore, a filtered air discharge outlet also enables the ventilation of smoke out. In order to further enhance the safety aspects of the unit, the Falck group also has several facilities worldwide designated with the task of training the engineers that build and work within the HAZTEC enclosures.

According to Todd, the HAZTEC has been very well received by Falck Alford’s many customers. He continues: “We have provided more than 900 of these enclosures so far, and all have been without incident. It uses a new scaffold-like integration that means that it can be used anywhere, and it is therefore much easier to set up than similar habitats made by our competitors – our design can cut installation time down by half. It also removes weather from the equation, as customers using the HAZTEC can weld in high winds, heavy rain, snow, sleet and even darkness. Up to three of them can be operated on a single site, working independently with their own security and control systems.”

The fact that each HAZTEC can be manufactured according to unique specifications means that each customer can get the bespoke product they need. Todd explains: “We get involved at the early stages of the projects, working together with both the oilfield operator and the contractor that will be conducting the welding services. Our duty is to come up with a safe work plan that will ensure both companies will meet their goals.”

Whilst Falck Alford’s HAZTEC has garnered significant success, this has not stopped the company from continuing to look for new ways of improving it further. Todd highlights: “Research and development is very important to us, and we welcome our customers to conduct annual audits upon us to ensure that we can meet the levels of quality that we promise. We will always enhance both our product and service portfolio when there are opportunities to do so and we will implement new features into the HAZTEC when we feel it is necessary.”

Development is vital to Falck Alford’s success in the future, and the company is always exploring new areas of potential – whether this is new products or new markets. Todd concludes: “We are really pushing into both the UK and Nigeria, and we also have a good foothold in Angola now too, where we have been present since 2002. A new HAZTEC base of operations has been opened in Trinidad too as we look to continue spreading our influence into new markets.”

Falck Alford
Services: Welding enclosures