USA: Ellicott Announces Major Personnel Additions

Ellicott Dredge Enterprises has announced two major personnel changes to its senior management team.

Gert de Vries has joined as Senior Director of Engineering, in which capacity he will be supporting the engineering departments of all of Ellicott’s brands, principally Ellicott and Rohr-Idreco.

“He will also be mentoring our engineering teams, which is extremely important to us given that the dredges we manufacture are highly-engineered products,” Ellicott announced.

Additionally, Rob Schettle has been promoted to General Manager at Ellicott’s subsidiary Liquid Waste Technology. He will now be responsible for running the plant in New Richmond, Wisconsin, the world’s most modern dredge production facility.

Gert de Vries, Senior Director of Engineering

Gert provides a wealth of dredge design knowledge and experience. He received his degree in Naval Architecture/Shipbuilding Engineering from the Haarlem Technical College in the Netherlands. He has worked for IHC, Vosta, and Damen. Gert’s most recent employer was IHC, where he served as Deputy Director of their Vuyk Engineering unit since 1985. He has experience with various types of dredges including cutter suction, trailing hopper, back-hoe, and deep suction.

In his new position, Gert will be a consultant and advisor to all Ellicott’s engineering groups, in both the U.S. and Europe.

Rob Schettle, General Manager, New Richmond, WI

As LWT’s Engineering Manager since 2010, Rob is familiar with both the Ellicott and the IMS/LWT product lines and manufacturing/assembly processes. In addition, Rob’s prior positions at FGWA and at Red Devil Equipment Company (both OEM suppliers of material handling equipment) have given him a wealth of experience in engineering, manufacturing, quality, and facilities management. Rob has also led ISO implementations, lean manufacturing initiatives, and reduced engineering lead times through process changes and automation.

Rob graduated Magna Cum Laude from the University of Wisconsin-Stout with a degree in Industrial Technology – Product Development. He also holds a degree from Century College in Mechanical Drafting. Rob replaces Jim Pflueger who retired last year after more than 20 years with LWT.

As General Manager, Rob assumes responsibility for all operations at the New Richmond plant. Besides the Liquid Waste Technology, Mud Cat™, and Innovative Material Systems auger dredge equipment produced in New Richmond, several of the Ellicott Dredge Dragon® cutter dredge models are also produced there.

Marty Barnes, COO of Ellicott, said: “I am excited to have these two join the Ellicott team as we enter our 129th year in business. We are pleased to be able to attract talent both from within our organization, and outside.”

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Press Release, February 7, 2014