Leash, Collar, Blackline Device — Everything a Gas Leak-Hunting Dog Needs

Blackline Safety’s first four-legged customer validates her stellar nose with GPS-enabled gas monitors.

• Client: K9 Leak Hunters

• Devices: G6 and G7 rental devices

• How are the devices used?: The company’s pipeline leak-sniffing dog, Nala, wears a Blackline Safety G6 single gas detector while out in the field. Her handler, Jay, wears a pumped G7c Multi-Gas detector to collect GPS-tagged data on the gas readings Nala detects. 

• How does Blackline help?: The data provided by Blackline validates Nala’s finds, provides compliance-ready data for the company’s clients, and the SOS and communication functions add peace of mind to Nala’s handler when working alone in the wild.

Not Your Average Lone Worker

On a regular workday, lone worker Nala gets up, eats breakfast, commutes to site, and then runs full speed on all fours along the length of a pipeline sniffing for gas leaks buried up to four meters deep. That’s because Nala is a three-year-old East German Shepherd, part of a one-man, one-dog team at Calgary-based company K9 Leak Hunters.

The CSO — Chief Sniffing Officer — was literally born to do this, says her boss and handler, Jay Stephens. “All she wants to do is work,” he says. But that doesn’t mean she doesn’t need to be protected on the job just like any other lone worker. That’s how she ended up being Blackline Safety’s first ever four-legged customer.

Open for Business

After his family’s two Siberian Huskies passed away, Stephens began researching which type of dog to get next. That’s when he stumbled on a breeder of elite DDR German Shepherd working dogs in Oklahoma. After bringing Nala home to Calgary, Stephens began scent detection training with the six-month-old pup, where she excelled. When she turned one, it came time to pick her K9 specialty. Stephens decided on pipeline leak detection because, with over 15 years working in utility protection and damage prevention, he was already familiar with, and passionate about, limiting the risks that gas can pose to workers and to a community. The two travelled to Florida to train with an expert for a month, and followed up with daily training back at home.  
“Gas leaks happen all the time and they’re dangerous, but being able to help prevent accidents is my mission in life,” he says. That’s how K9 Leak Hunters was born. 

How Nala uses Blackline

When Nala’s out in the field, sometimes covering hundreds of miles of pipeline, she goes equipped with a lightweight Blackline G6 wearable single gas detector attached to her harness. This is, of course, on top of Nala’s own personal gas detector: her nose.

“The way we view it is, the tech is phenomenal, the dog is another layer,” says Stephens. “She smells in parts per billion, which beats most of the traditional sensors. Then we validate it with tech for compliance.”

Stephens follows her — she’s never out of sight — wearing a cloud-connected pumped G7c Multi-gas device, for its enhanced connectivity and access to interactive reports. By using these Blackline devices in the field, Jay can both verify Nala’s findings, decreasing the likelihood of a false indication, and go back to the client with all the information they need.

“I want to know I can give a client an accurate report,” he says. “You can’t have a legitimate conversation with pipeline folks without having a report with the GPS data, the LEL readings, or spikes in H2S. All that info can be used to help them make data-informed decisions.”

Blackline Live makes the data collected by Jay's monitor available real-time, allowing him to review GPS-tagged gas readings at the end of each day or project. He can then build a detailed compliance report for his client, providing them with specific information on the location of each set of pertinent gas detection readings. This allows him to back up Nala's nose with specific, quantifiable data that allows his clients to make data-driven decisions. 

Blackline Rentals: Your Teammate When You Need It

Being a small business means there’s not always capital to invest in the best, but Blackline’s technology has become invaluable to the success and safety of K9 Leak Hunters and their two intrepid employees — all because it’s available to rent on-demand at daily, weekly, or monthly intervals, with users only paying for the time and number of devices they need.

“The rental experience has been phenomenal,” says Stephens. “You get a piece of ridiculously amazing tech for a fraction of the cost of other gas detectors that don’t do the same things. That’s a huge win for a small business.”

The additional support from the rentals team made up of industry veterans makes the service even more valuable and turns a dynamic duo into a full-fledged team of experts.

Sit, Stay, Get Home Safe

For Stephens, whose family members outside of Nala consist of a wife and four daughters, safety is the number one priority.

“For me, it’s all about making a living and coming home safe to my family,” he says. “I would tell anyone to get a device like this because without it, you’re relying on circumstance to save you.”

And as much as he and Nala keep each other company, G7’s emergency response alerts make the family feel more at ease in the case of serious incidents. Additional lone worker features go beyond gas monitoring, detecting incidents like falls, no motion, missed check-ins and more, and monitoring in Blackline Live allows team members to see a worker’s exact location in the field — which keeps Stephens’ wife at ease. “Oftentimes I’m in the middle of nowhere, so my wife is significantly happier that I have a fall protection alert and SOS latch to contact emergency services,” says Stephens.

That feeling of security for Stephens and his dog makes him feel supported on the job and like he and Nala aren’t alone.    

“I feel like I have a million-dollar team backing me. I have a bench full of rockstars.” 

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