Page 38: of Marine Technology Magazine (September 2013)

Welaptega (Mi?kmaq for ?eagle eye?) Marine Ltd. headquartered in Halifax, Nova Scotia and with several global operations, has become a world leader in risk-based mooring integrity veri cation for the offshore oil and gas industry. It develops and commercializes technologies for the inspection of moor- ings and other underwater assets such as pipelines and well- head controls.The agriculture comes in with Tony Hall, the company?s founder and CEO. Born in England, he moved to Canada at a young age where his father had a small farm in Nova Scotia. He initially followed that farm path and got an undergraduate degree in agriculture. But he drifted away from the land to the sea and into aquaculture where he earned a Masters degree in Marine Biology from the Memorial University in Newfound- land and Labrador. In his search to  nd a career path, he began integrating some of his agriculture background with his work in aquaculture. He started applying agriculture pest management to marine growth on mooring lines and subsea structures with the prem- ise that a lack of regular maintenance on these subsea assets could cause deterioration of the structure by the marine envi- ronment which in turn goes to the subject of safety. In 1991 Hall started Welaptega, ?borrowed a few grand? and went to Aberdeen, Scotland, a hot bed of offshore exploration and production, to sell his research.?I literally went to oil companies pounding on doors,? Hall said. On his  rst trip to Aberdeen, he landed a contract with a British gas company who liked his approach to the issue. Following his system to measure marine growth on subsea assets, he was asked by companies if he could to measure chains and their integrity when used as mooring lines. It was a new arena for Welaptega to explore. In 1996 Hall moved the company to the U.K., to work on new technologies and systems and developed a chain measurement system which could supply data for inspecting moorings on semi-submersibles. That system was followed by the develop- ment of yet another for rope moorings involving high resolu- tion cameras to identify potential problems.Over the years the company has developed a strategy in tack- ling these inspection projects.?Our progressive inspection philosophy is a guided examina- Wire Frame Chain One on One September 201338 MTRMTR #7 (34-49).indd 38MTR #7 (34-49).indd 388/26/2013 11:27:21 AM8/26/2013 11:27:21 AM