Hibbard Inshore - Company Profile |
Hibbard Inshore and its predecessors have been providing underwater and surface remote controlled services for over 20 years to the electric power industry, construction firms, scientific agencies, water treatment authorities, waste treatment authorities, and branches of the military throughout North America and the Caribbean. Jim Hibbard started the company in 1984 with one underwater ROV, the RCV-225, one of the first production commercial ROV models developed. Since then Hibbard Inshore has grown in terms of people, equipment, capability, and experience. Our experience lies not only in perfecting routine inspections but also in accepting and completing unique projects that demand new technology. Throughout the years one constant at Hibbard Inshore has been the dedication of its employees. The only company of its kind for more than 20 years, Hibbard Inshore stands alone as its own entity with a number of underwater remotely operated vehicle (ROV) systems supporting numerous sensor families, including high resolution video, imaging sonar, ultrasonics, ground penetrating radar, and positioning sonar. The company has maintained multi-year federal contracts for ROV services as well as providing demand services to large primary contractors and engineering consulting firms. Hibbard Inshore has performed environmental and cultural resource surveys for federal agencies and regional marine archeological firms. A closely held U. S. company, Hibbard Inshore has been under the same ownership and management since its beginning. Conventional Projects and Emergency Response |
Hibbard Inshore supports conventional deployments and emergency response contracts. During the 1992 Great Chicago Flood, which closed the famous Chicago Loop, the company operated around the clock, locating underwater failures and directing diver safety operations for nearly a month without any equipment downtime or crew injuries. This contract demonstrated the company's responsiveness, high capacity, and management ability. Under more normal conditions, the company recently completed ROV inspections of the Middle Fork Tunnel in California, the Ponce Ocean Outfall, and the Bad Creek Pumped Storage Station in Salem, South Carolina. The company successfully completed a nine-month contract in 1998 for the entry, inspection, and repair of three large tunnels that had been damaged. This operation required the location of historic lines, drilling intervention, full acoustic imaging, high-resolution video, positioning, and ground penetrating radar. During the past two years, Hibbard Inshore completed three long deployments in the Caribbean to inspect and support repair of a 3.5-mile ocean outfall. The deployment included long-range internal ROV inspection deep water open ocean external pipe and ballast inspection. The company is currently engaged in operations that require ground penetrating radar, imaging sonar for internal measurement, ultrasonic testing, diver monitoring, optical alignment, underwater material transport, debris clearance, video documentation, operational management assistance, Vehicle Assisted Tooling© (VAT), and monitoring.
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