Yesterday – 1979

Northern Underwater Systems started in July of 1979 when a fire fighting helicopter pilot came up to me at the swimming pool where I worked as a lifeguard. He had hit the wrong button on his control and dropped his water bucket into a northern Alberta lake instead of opening it to fill it up. His boss was so mad – the pilot offered us cash to help him out.

Luckily my friend and I had just founded our commercial diving company.

So off we went.

Next a Hollywood production company came to town to produce a movie, and they needed safety divers and underwater stunt men.

We were heroes in our own minds, and had only been in business for a few days!

Since then I realized, over and over, that I was misled by these first two adventures. Commercial diving is hard work. Running a commercial diving company is harder yet.

Our next job was recovering a body that had been underwater for two weeks – we found it, but wished we had not.

The refineries called and wanted us to begin performing contaminated water diving. But they did not tell us about the contaminants in the water until afterwards.

I found out that, in order to succeed, we had to establish our own safe work practices and procedures. Our reputation grew. We started to act like an organization rather than an example of disorganization.

We started a company division in the Beaufort sea, and worked north of the Arctic circle on drill ships, dredge ships, and the largest floating dry dock in the world. We learned about helicopters, sea planes, living on a ship, and how, when it was four o’clock in the morning, the job had to be finished no matter how difficult it was or how long it was going to take.


Today – 2001

We now operate across western Canada, with experienced managers in Vancouver, Trail, Calgary, Fort McMurray, and Edmonton.

This month we are doing a mixed gas repair deep inside a hydro dam, dredging a ten acre lake, doing a sparger refit in a pulp mill contaminated effluent pond, draglining underwater to clean a pond full of bitumen, inspecting a two kilometer forced sewer main, and operating and renting pumps, pipe plugs, and barges in Western Canada.

Our business today continues to grow because of our integrity. N.U.S. is ISO 9001 Registered. This means we have an audited quality assurance program that is internationally recognized. We follow the best safe work practices and procedures. We understand that our safety and the quality of our work make lasting impressions that are more important than cost. Our clients appreciate our qualified and experienced personnel. We use and maintain the best equipment available for the tasks we undertake.

Tomorrow – 2002

N.U.S is building for the future by applying a systematic way of doing the diving business. We are continuing to expand by attracting and supporting regional managers across North America. These regional managers are diving supervisors and underwater entrepeneurs who are able to give their clients individual attention to their needs, while our head office takes care of all the headaches of running the business.

For more information contact: jleonard@nusgroup.com / www.nusgroup.com