Reflecting on 2024 and Looking Ahead with AGHP

On behalf of everyone at the AGHP, I would like to wish you and yours a Happy New Year!

First and foremost, we’d like to acknowledge the dedicated agencies, contractors, and industry professionals diligently working to aid those affected by Hurricane Helen across Appalachia and to restore the nation’s infrastructure. As safety is always in our thoughts, we wish you health and safety at home and in your workplace for the New Year.

At the heart of our association is geohazard education and industry awareness. In 2024, we welcomed Ty Ortiz who brings more than 30 years of geohazard experience in the public and private sectors as the new Chairman of the Education Committee.

This year, we saw another expansion of our Rope Access Safety Recognition program. We will be announcing the 2024 recipients soon. Please take a moment to find out more about past recipients and the program, as this is one of the most important initiatives we undertake to ensure everyone comes home safely at the end of the day! We encourage all companies involved in rope access work to submit an application in April 2025 when the application period begins.

Over the year, we also hosted five great webinars on various geohazard topics. We’d like to extend a special thanks to Casey Smith of Gannett Fleming, Ross Cutts of Geosetta, Grace Huang of RocScience, and Silas Nichols of FHWA for their time and effort in sharing their experience and expertise with us. All of our previous webinars can be viewed on the AGHP website after logging into the Member Center. Planning has already begun for future presentations, including “Steep Slope Rope Access – Standard Industry Safety Methods and Procedures,” to be presented by the Rope Access Committee. If you are interested in giving a webinar, please reach out to the Education Committee through info@GeohazardAssociation.org.

We also pause to pay tribute to John Duffy, who passed away on May 15, 2024. John was co-chair of the AGHP’s Rope Access Committee and had been with the AGHP from its inception. His leadership and desire to create positive change will be sorely missed. John was a retired Caltrans Engineering Geologist and later an Engineering Geologist consultant for Yeh and Associates. John was an astute and practical Engineering Geologist who generously shared his knowledge with fellow colleagues. He was an adventurer and innovator.

I would like to thank Axis Stabilization for joining the association at the Corporate Member level for the coming year. Sustaining and Corporate Members are integral parts of our association, along with our individual memberships, without whom we could not survive!

Current Sustaining Members include:

• Geobrugg
• Geostabilization International
• Maccaferri
• Trumer Schutzbauten

Current Corporate  Members include:

• Access Limited Construction
• Apex Rockfall Mitigation
• BGC Engineering
• Gannett Fleming | TranSystems
• IDS GeoRadar
• RocScience
• Williams Form Engineering

For the 2025 year, we are pleased to announce that we have restructured our membership model to include three tiers of corporate membership to accommodate companies of various size and means of contributing. To join the AGHP or renew your membership please visit our membership page at https://geohazardassociation.org/memberships/.

At the board level, please join me in welcoming Simon Boone (GeoStabilization International) and Brandon Manahan (Apex Rockfall Mitigation) to our Board of Directors and thanking our outgoing President, Ahren Bichler (Trumer Schutzbauten) for his tremendous leadership and stewardship of the AGHP during his six-plus-year tenure. Ahren will be staying on the board and serving as Past President.

The new 2024-2025 executive officers include Joe Krupansky (Gannett Fleming) as President, Jake Davidson (IDS Georadar) as Vice president, Wesley Ashwood (WSP) as Secretary, and Mike Koutsourais (Maccaferri) will be staying on another term as Treasurer. Rounding out the Board of Directors are Pierce Runnels (Geobrugg), Wayne Ingram (Williams Form), Kris Holm (BGC Engineering), and Jill Dekoekkoek (Oregon DOT).

Please feel free to reach out to any of our board members with questions, concerns or a simple thank you for their contributions!

Cheers,

Joe Krupansky,

President, Association of Geohazard Professionals