INF Spring 2015
INITY ORMER
The Infinity Group Houston Ship Channel Office Celebrate102014 1,199,758 hours Incident worked Celebrates Yearswith Without an OSHAman Recordable and a ZERO OSHA Recordable Incident Rate.
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his milestone is achieved through the personal In addition to the Houston Ship Channel Office’s accomcommitment each and every day, from all employThe Infinity Group as aPictured: whole isL celebratto R: Alex Castaneda, mitment plishment, by each individual to take ees, committing to The Infinity Group’s Safety ing the year 2014 with a total of 5,986,001 man hours Charles Massey, Patrick Harrison, vices recently celebrated 10 the necessary actions to ensure philosophy; “…making safety an important part of our worked and accomplishing an outstanding OSHA Total Ramiro Estrada, Michael Bradbery, years recordable free at the their fellow co-workers, in addidaily routine”. The Infinity Group Houston Ship Channel Recordable Incident Rate (TRIR)Eric ofWalker, 0.23. Alfredo To each em- and Hernandez Johann Haltermann site. The tion to themselves, goes home Management would like to take the time to acknowledge ployee of The Infinity Group, thank you for your Not part,Pictured: as Guillermo Urrutia. maintenance crew has completed safe every day. Michael Bradbery Amador, Manualthat Garcia, Orthe entire team and commend the employees for an outan individual, and as a team player,Juan your role made nearly 500,000 man-hours without and his crew were given jackets in lando Garza, Jessie Goodwin, Luis standing accomplishment and job well done! number possible.
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a recordable incident during a 10 year period. This was not achieved through luck but a personal com-
recognition for their outstanding safety performance. Keep up the good work.
Lopez, DavidInformer Melendez, Moses Infinity 1 Melendez Jr., and Jesus Quiroz.
Infinity Maintenance Services at Johann Haltermann Celebrates 10 Years Without an OSHA Recordable Incident
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nfinity Maintenance Services recently celebrated 12 years recordable free at the Johann Haltermann site. This was not achieved through luck but a personal commitment by each individual to take the necessary actions to ensure their fellow co-workers, in addition to themselves, goes home safe every day. Michael Bradbery and his crew were most recently taken to dinner at the Monument Inn to celebrate this achievement and in recognition for their outstanding safety performance. Keep up the good work.
Pictured: Front row sitting, left to right: Jessie Goodwin, Percy Roberson & Shane Price Second row, left to right: Charles Massey (kneeling down), Tre Emerson, Jesus Quiroz, Juan Amador & Alfredo Hernandez (foreman) Third row, left to right: Orlando Garza, Justin Martin & Ramiro Estrada Back row, left to right: Michael Bradbery (me), David Melendez, Luis Lopez, Daniel Jasso, Mitchell Moyer, Torrey Jones & Chris Davis Not in the picture: Francisco Aguilar. Superintendent: Bennie Mikel. Company: Infinity Construction Services, LP
The Infinity Group Management Recognition Program; Doing The Right Thing‌
Pictured: Javier Castillo, Mike Tanguma, Adrian Torres, Angel Torres, and Jeff Thompson. Superintendent: Bennie Mikel Company: Infinity Construction Services, LP
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he Safety Management Team recognizes front line supervisors and employees for their performance and efforts in demonstrating, performing, and promoting
safe work practices. Whether it is leading their crews, a member of the crew recognizing a hazard and making an intervention, or going above and beyond their normal job duties, we want to recognize those individuals for their initiative and commitment. When the individual or group of employees is nominated, they are invited to a recognition lunch that is attended by corporate management, safety management, employees’ supervisors and the nominated employees. The employees are presented with an award for their contribution and commitment towards safety on the jobsite. Jeff Thompson and his scaffolding crew identified a leak and reported it to permit/operations room immediately. The crew was brought down as the leak got worse and no one was injured or made contact with the rusted flange while working in the pipe rack. Also, at the scaffold yard, Jeff and his crew were loading and unloading material when they came across an odor of chlorine. Jeff and crew immediately shut down and evacuated crosswind and up.
Description of Event:
Gilbert intervened on another contractor that was working on some overhead doors. He had noticed that the door had been propped open while the technicians were working on the door. Gilbert knew what could happen due to the stored energy had the prop come out of the door. Along with some other safety issues, Gilbert took time to coach and show them the proper way to work on the overhead door.
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Pictured: Gilbert Woodard and Ronald Dudley Name of Recognized Person: Gilbert Woodard Company: United Electrical & Instrumentation Superintendent: Ronald Dudley
UEI Overhead Crane & Hoist Technician Program
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nited Electrical & Instrumentation (UEI) is conducting an Overhead Crane & Hoist Technician Program to train UEI Crane & Elevator employees to become Qualified OH Crane & Hoist Technicians. A Qualified Technician will provide periodic service and inspection on overhead cranes, hoists and the associated components at the request of various customers. The program will provide the technician
The Infinity Training Shop for Welders and Fabricators is led by Mr. Fred Barton and Tony Cadiero. Our instructors are handpicked from current shop welders and include Mr. Rex Mears, Mr. Saul Calvillo, Mr. Julio Rosalles and Mr. Randall Johnson. We believe that utilizing instructors currently welding in the shop give our students the best possible training available. The program consists of
with a thorough understanding of the ASME B30 standards and regulations of OH Cranes, Hoists and associated components. The program consists of instructor-led sessions, hands-on inspections of equipment, written assessments and practical assessments. The ultimate outcome of the program is to provide more marketable services in the inspection and repair of Overhead Cranes & Hoists.
training the students on how to weld using the heli-arc process on flat plate and progressing to learn how to weld on two inch carbon steel and alloy pipe. All trainees will go through math, blueprint and isometric reading, tools of the trade instruction along with basic understanding of code requirements and will finish up with hands on training. Our goal is to train welders that can move into the welding
role with training and confidence to perform at a high level of competency in all aspects of shop fabrication. Our classes are held on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday nights from 4:30 till 7:30 pm. Currently we have 15 students enrolled in the program. Upon completion of the program, the students are issued welding tests in accordance with industry standards by our QC Department.
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We are Growing… Help us in honoring those with new responsibilities as well as welcoming new additions to our teams. Vance Stuart our new Corporate Safety Manager is comes to our group with 20 plus years’ experience in the safety field. He is responsible to manage the safety personnel and programs; assure compliance to rules, procedures and policy; and address safety issues arising in the assigned region of work activity. Roger Blackburn has been with The Infinity Group now for a few years! We would like to recognize him for all that he does both throughout and for our industry and congratulate him on his most recent achievement. He actively serves the communities of our Gulf Coast area through his participation on several different boards. Roger serves in such areas as: Chairperson for MSTI – Merit Shop Training Institute for the Gulf Coast Chapter of ABC (Associated Builders and Contractors of America); He is a member of the Economic Alliance Houston Port Region and has been elected to serve on their Board of Directors through 2016; He sits on the Board of Directors for Reach Out America a group that serves as first responders when catastrophes strike an area; recently he was asked to serve as an Advisor to San Jacinto College in the area of Craft Training and Workforce Development; and most recently has been chosen as the 2015 Chairman for the Petrochemical & Maritime Outlook Conference Committee (PMOC). Congratulations Roger, we appreciate your hard work and dedication. Paul Longino has finally settled into his role as an Executive Account Manager for United Electrical and Instrumentation Services, Ltd. Oyster Creek Office. His background in Safety, Business Development, Construction Projects, Maintenance Projects and Service Contracts adds over 18 years of quality experience to our Business Development team and continues to bring promising ideas as well as new ways to help grow and expand our companies. Melissa Newman joined the Business Development team back in December 2014 as the new Business Development Coordinator. Her responsibilities include supporting our sales team and general managers in the La Porte office. With her experience in the legal field as a paralegal, she is able to add a different dynamic as well as new inventive ideas to the team and looks forward to tackling any challenges, tasks and projects assigned to her.
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Vanessa Gonzales comes to The Infinity Group Estimating department in our La Porte office bringing with her over 5 years of experience to help her in her new administrative support role. She is the point of contact in the estimating department for Infinity Construction Services and is responsible for receiving the bid package information as well as making sure that they make it to their final destinations in a timely fashion. In addition to making sure that the estimating department runs smoothly, Vanessa also does data entry into a specialized proprietary estimating program that we use in house to support this department. Eliana Gamino is the newest timekeeper for our Insulation and Scaffolding division of Infinity Construction, LP. In her new role, she has proven herself to be a dedicated employee and is responsible for making sure the 100+ employees in her division get their time entered correctly, processes invoices, FTO’s and is in charge of the cost tracking for each one of their jobs. Maria Cerino is an Office Manager for the Mechanical Department. She has 15 plus years of experience in the construction field and currently supports multiple superintendents and their crews. Her duties and responsibilities include: timekeeping, procurement and cost tracking. Jesus Gabriel Olivares is the new Cost Control Lead for Maintenance and Capital Projects. Gabriel has worked in the construction field since 2009 in the Project Controls area and holds a Bachelor of Science Degree in Industrial Engineering. We welcome back Theresa Devine to Infinity Construction Services, LP after a one year leave of absence. Her career started as a clerk at Exxon BOP with The Infinity Group in 1995. She moved up to a timekeeper position in the years to follow working under the same boss for twenty (20) plus years, until he retired. We are glad to have you back and wish you much success in your new position as the Timekeeper Supervisor for our La Porte Ship Channel Office.
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We’re Growing
he Infinity Group is in the process of renovating and expanding our facilities in La Porte. This office has been servicing the Houston Ship Channel area since 1994. We are located on South Battleground Road along with many other industrial supply and service companies. The original facilities started with a staff of 8 including Employment, Business Development and Construction Management. Today we have grown to a staff of 28, having added Project Managers and staff for UEI, Brazos M & E and our Scaffolding division. We have completed our parking lot expansion by adding 68 spaces to go with the existing 36. This was surely needed to support our growing staff and increased employment office traffic. In addition to our parking lot expansion was an expansion of our laydown area and equipment yard. This will help accommodate our growing scaffold and project inventories, as well as provide more temporary fabrication area. Along with the new parking area and landscaping, we have replaced our original signage with an internally illuminated design incorporating all the company logos and a wireless message board. Our next phase of construction will be a 3,900 sq. ft. expansion to our La Porte office to house a new employment processing and training facility. This will provide flexible space for modern employment and training environments and allow us to meet the growing demands of the industry. The former employment facility will be completely redesigned and improved to accommodate additional office space and a more centralized estimating department.
Heat exchanger
Our architects and internal planning team have been developing the plans for the new addition and we expect to begin construction this summer. We look forward to watching our new addition and renovations take shape to support Infinity’s continuing growth in the Houston Ship Channel area industrial market.
Morgan Word has stepped into his position as a Superintendent for Infinity Construction Services, LP. With his “go get ‘em” attitude, hard work and dedication, the millwright division has grown to include expanding our services as follows: • pump base removal and install; • laser alignments (to the 1/1000 inch); • coupling change outs; • heat exchangers; • motor install and removals; • custom built pump/motor bases.
Completed heat exchanger
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Career Fair
On February 5, 2015, United Electrical & Instrumentation employees participated in the Industrial Job Fair held at the Brazosport College. UEI was there seeking qualified applicants to join their team.
The Infinity Group is an active participant in the Houston Business Roundtable and most recently attended the Workforce Development Breakfast Summit as one of the breakfast sponsors. The summit featured updates and panel discussions focusing on the current workforce for our industry. The meeting started with the Pledge of Allegiance and Roger Blackburn of The Infinity Group was asked to deliver the opening prayer. We had the pleasure of listening to a number of different speakers from the following organizations: Houston Area Safety Council (HASC); East Harris County Manufacturers Association (EHMCA), ChevronPhillips, Associated Builders and Contractors, Inc. (ABC); Construction & Maintenance Education Foundation (CMEF); National Center for Construction Education and Research (NCCER); and the National Association for Construction (NAC). In their presentations, they gave us an overview of the current state of the workforce in our industry. Roy Watson with CPChem highlighted the Junior Achievement League in his presentation along with how House Bill 5 targets the current eighth grade classes in and around our area. The classes of 2019 are the targeted group of our future workforce as we will
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be losing a large percentage of the current workforce in our industry to retirement at that time. If you don’t already participate, The Infinity Group highly encourages your participation in this great organization.
Letters We Like Mr. Vincent Means – INFINITY GROUP Dear Vincent: Because of your generosity a senior citizen is able to ride the Heritage Center’s Transportation Van each week to a doctors’ appointment in Houston, a single mother with small children is able to get assistance with rent from Calhoun County Community Ministries, a single working dad is able to have peace of mind knowing that his children are well-cared for and getting help with their homework at the Calhoun County YMCA’s After School Program and a premature child and her parents receive support and treatment for developmental delays and disabilities at STARS (South Texas Assessment and Referral Services) in their high risk development clinic. You are a hero to our neighbors who have needed some sort of assistance this year. You are the “magic” we have spoken about this year in our theme, The MAGIC of Caring, and through your donation the lives of these families have improved. Your sponsorship of the annual Formosa Golf Tournament benefitting United Way is helping our fourteen partner agencies continue to provide programs and services that focus on Education, Health and Income – the foundation for a good life and small communities here in Calhoun County. Please share our sincere thanks with your company and the great folks who participated in the golf tournament. Thank you for choosing to LIVE UNITED. Sincerely, Carolyn R. Adrian Executive Director United Way of Calhoun County On behalf of The Dow Chemical Company, I would like to take this opportunity to thank the United Electrical and Instrumentation’s Crane and Elevator Group for achieving an almost unheard of safety record of 20 years OSHA Recordable Incident Free. This was done by having very dedicated employees, working in every block in the division around almost every type chemical that we manufacture, and still going home safely. Dedication of this magnitude is the reason that Dow Chemical is able to stick out its chest and proclaim to be one of the premier chemical companies in the world, and live by the motto of “We Will Do It SAFELY or We Won’t Do It”. Again, thank you and the entire UEI Crane and Elevator group for your dedication to safety and a magnificent safety record. John Anderson D.A.S. Cranes and Elevators Dow Chemical Texas Operations Freeport, Texas Economic Alliance Members, We’d like to extend an invitation to all of our members who may be interested in participating on the Petrochemical & Maritime Outlook Conference Committee. This group has developed the strategy and led the efforts to create one of the most effective forecasting conferences in the country. The PMOC has grown in size and scope each of the first five years and 2015 should be no different. We are honored to announce that Roger Blackburn, Executive Account Manager at Infinity Construction Services, LP will serve as Chairman of the 2015 Committee. Please feel free to respond to this email if you are interested in joining this great committee. Meetings are the third Tuesday of each month at 3:30 and the first one will be next Tuesday, January 20th. Thanks, Chad Burke President & CEO
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Infinity Construction Services, LP P.O. Box 327 Clute, Texas 77531-0327 979.388.8579 For change of address, please contact: Michele Newman Wells Melissa 281.478.4828 mnewman@inf-grp.com marketing@inf-grp.com Mike White (BME) With over 25,000 man-hours without an incident is a testament to the Safety culture Brazos brings to the table. To Oscar and crew for a job well done. (Insert picture here) Regards Phillip Thames | Project Manager CDI Corporation 11200 Richmond Ave., Suite 500 | Houston, TX 77082 Ph: 713-280-2664 | Cell: 713-703-2869 | www.cdicorp.com James and Terryl (Fab), We at EPOXY 2 would also like to extend our most sincere thanks for all of your hard work and dedication to deliver an extremely amount of piping in a short time. You have helped us stay on schedule with our shutdown. I will send in a QSPP for your shop as soon as we get out of our shutdown and I have a little more time. John thanks for saying on top of all this work and seeing it through. We appreciate your dedication on this piping work. Johnny Gossett Epoxy Maintenance & Reliability James and Terry (Fab) Guy’s great job on getting these work orders out in record time. Kris & Terryl did a great job on calling me back and giving me updates on these jobs. The Jobs were moved up a week and Infinity answered the call and performed exceptional. Please tell all your Guys Great Job!!!! Johnny Gossett was very Happy of Deliver of all his PCS. John Goodson Dow Pipe Shop Kris (Fab), Thank you and the shop personnel for the quick response in getting this spool back to us. I am sure BASF appreciates this. Rusty Mangum
PRE-SORTED STANDARD U.S. Postage PAID Permit No. 777 Ontario, CA
Team (Fab): I wanted to share these comments from Earl, and from Mark Kuettel, the Site Incident Commander. I know we have said it over and over again, but your response to this incident has been nothing short of MIRACULOUS. Yesterday, in less than 24 hours, you achieved a mission that despite my positive affirmations, I was worried could have been Mission Impossible. With your positive, can do attitude, you once again delivered beyond expectations. I am overwhelmed with pride and am inspired to serve as your representative to the Site Emergency Operations Center. And most importantly, everyone went home in the same shape they came to work in, albeit, a little cold and weary! Thank you! Bob Thomas The Dow Chemical Company
QSPP Incident Report: Incident Title: VA-5 VAM O2 Analyzer Project - Excellent project execution, completed injury, incident free, and on schedule. “Want to recognize UEI and associated sub-contractor (Infinity) for a job well done. Completed all scope and additional change order work on schedule with no incidents. UEI had excellent coordination with operations and all involved disciplines. They did an outstanding job communicating; the two-week look ahead schedules and permit coordination meetings were beneficial in project execution. They were very reactive to our needs and exhibited the desire to meet all expectations. Mike Gregory the UEI representative did a good job keeping the project team abreast of impacts, suggested remediations, evergreen on progress and cost impacts. Thanks for a job well done.“ Initiator: Bill Young Dow Chemical