Summer 2015 Vol. 3 Issue 2 THE LATEST ON UNITED PIPING INC. ACTIVITIES Hydrovac Operator, Amy Schroeder, and Laborer, Todd Sprague, work steadily to open a hole for piping IN THIS ISSUE demolition. WORDS FROM BOB P2 Mackinaw Station Maintenance Enhancement Project SAFETY CORNER P3 By Ian Hassenstab EMPLOYEE RECOGNITION P4 Mackinaw City, MI – Work started on April 29th On June 10th, UPI worked alongside the New segment! This will be a section and the project launched with grubbing and Escanaba PLM to conduct the first of two outages to thank employees for their dedicated preliminary site work. Locates were completed, to take place over the life of the project. The service. By Mel Olson the construction trailers and temporary site line was shut down, more than 12,000 gallons amenities and utilities were installed, as was of product was drained, and the existing 30” SUPPORTING PIPELINES P5 temporary fencing. Excavation of Line 5 began sending trap and piping was cut out to allow Part 2: Why UPI supports national and to allow for the installation of a split tee fitting, for the layout and installation of future piping regional pipeline efforts, specifically followed by several arduous weeks of hydrovac and foundations. Simultaneously, 18 gaskets regarding environmental safety. By Bob for daylighting, and excavation of foundation (originally installed roughly 50 years ago) were Schoneberger footings. QA/QC Manager Mike Olson arrived on replaced in the existing pump house, all during site with the company’s new Optical Emissions an 18 hour outage! In place of the demolished BUG PROTECTION P6 Spectrometer (OES) machine to evaluate the carbon content of the existing pipe. This was piping, flanges were welded on, and blind flanges SHOP PRODUCTION P11 a first for UPI, and we hope to keep the OES bolted in place. machine busy in the future. Continued on Page 7 2015 FR CLOTHING Construction Words From Bob SAFETY CORNER PROGRAM Services-South By Bob Schoneberger, President Range Pipe Yard By Shawn Helmer feedback received was awesome. As of April 15, 2015 the following FR What a difference a couple of months makes, our The (IIF) Incident and Injury Free safety program policy takes effect: By Dan Berg There has been plenty to talk about since our last slow start to the year is clearly behind us. We publication. First and foremost, we have made was a focal point the past couple months. In Employees that are required to wear Another successful job performed by have picked up some fabrication work, a couple it nearly 6 months without an OSHA Recordable May, we communicated our mutual commitment FR clothing are eligible for 2-FR shirts UPI! We started receiving pipe by rail valve replacements, and some preliminary line injury. This is absolutely fantastic! We are also statements with IIF Leadership as well as our Site and 2-FR pants or 3-FR coveralls. at the South Range pipe yard May of locating work on the possible line 3 replacement closing in on 1.5 Million hours without a lost time Supervision. This program has been a fantastic Employees become eligible at the 2014 for the STEP project and 3 other project coming up in a couple years. AND - We incident. Your dedication to working safely and addition to STEP and has led to a greater one year anniversary of their last FR Enbridge stations. When the rail were just awarded the Line 2 hydro-test and watching out for your coworkers is the reason we partnership with Enbridge. There was a lot of clothing receipt (not including winter pipe came on site it was nothing like clothing) or upon employment for water acquisition projects we were looking for. are able to accomplish records like this. I would heavy lifting to get this program going and there what or when the schedule showed. new employees required to wear FR It includes 330 miles of 26” active oil line and it like to share my genuine appreciation for all of are lots of thanks and “atta-boys” to be given, It would arrive 2 or 3 days early to 3 clothing. Shirts with the UPI logo are will be hydrostatically tested while never really your efforts in making these accomplishments but at the end of the day the program is about weeks late with 3 to 15 rail cars with available at the UPI office and the reality. Next, we have finally filled our Safety sending everyone home in as good of condition, various sizes of pipe and it would removing it from service. It’s a very complex job pants are available at Marine General will not lower our safety and quality standards Manager vacancy and are excited to have Jason if not better, than when they arrived at work. take 72 hours to get them off loaded involving well over 100 field sites that will require in Duluth, MN. to meet anyone’s.” Fast approaching 1.5 Million It has taken the effort and commitment on the and cars released. There were nearly “work” prior to testing: leak detection services, on board! consecutive man-hours without a lost time injury. part of everyone to make IIF a reality. We have To check your eligibility date please 1,000 joints of pipe offloaded and 800 valve sealing and checking, water chlorination In May, we held our first Safety Week event placed an IIF Communications Board in the UPI contact Sue Krenz at 218-727-7676. joints loaded and sent out with no and dechlorination, and a 50-page execution plan Thank you all for your continued diligence and sponsored by APi Group. This was a concept Tent adjacent to the project to inform everyone of incidents. There was approximately to bring it all together! For the water acquisition, awareness for your coworkers. Our HIGH shop developed by the Construction Industry 38,000 feet of pipe in the yard that we teamed up with Northland for the dirt work repair rate from a year ago has been solved! Our Roundtable and was dedicated to the safety developments unique to the program. was sent out to UPI and other pipeline on the 450’ x 1200’ water “pond” required to fill QA/QC manager Mike Olson, upon close scrutiny and welfare of all employees working in the In closing, I want to reiterate my appreciation Weather Monitoring contractors in the area. A big thank the line. A short fuse on all this work as we were of some of the fittings and welds, indicated construction industry. A special emphasis was for all of your efforts and contributions when you to all involved! scheduled to start a month ago. Dave Halberg that we were getting paint contamination into placed on the topics of fall prevention, distracted it comes to workplace safety. You are the By Bill Jacobs and crew will get it done! This will likely put the weld zones. We changed our method for driving, material handling, and accident difference makers. Watch out for one another and It’s getting to be that time of year around 16 individual crews to work and employ cleaning the bevels and BINGO, we go from a prevention. Events were held each day during do not take offense if someone stops you to chat where we will be seeing severe QEP Flow Lines more than 200 good Union workers at the peak. repair rate well north of 10% in the shop to less Safety Week to address all of these topics. about a work activity with safety in mind. They weather in the form of thunder storms By Justin Dittmar than 2% overnight! Thanks Oly!!!! Safety and Thanks to DBI / SALA for the fall protection might just be doing it in your best interest. Until containing lightning, high winds, etc. We have a couple integrity digs for TransCanada quality will always be a constant focus. Our drop test demonstration at the UPI Tent located next time, be safe and stay focused on safety, be For those of you who do not have the We recently completed another to do. One in the UP is going on right now and performance to date is fantastic. Everyone, at STEP. It was a great demonstration and the it at work, or at home. WeatherBug app on your phone or project for QEP Resources in the one in Nebraska on Keystone. All great news. keep doing the great/safe jobs you are and then laptop, you may want to take a look Watford City area of North Dakota. constantly and consistently repeat that effort and at it. When lightning is within a 30 The project consisted of fabricating There’s lots of great projects to look at too. Mel focus, for yourself and everyone around you. All I At the game, Bob presented Mr. Monaco with mile radius of where you are located, and installing 6 flow lines and A WILD Gift a personalized Minnesota Wild jersey. With and I made a trip out to see the folks from Energy ask is that we continue to be the industry leaders it will send an alert to your device. In connecting the individual well heads the name “Sandpiper” on the back along with the drop down menu at the top of the Transfer (ETC) on their “Rover” project in OH/MI in safely performing hazardous work over and By Eva Meierhoff to the location’s production facility. the number 16, the jersey was a clear way to display you can use the “Spark” option a couple of weeks ago and it went really well. over again.