Mykel Hawke is one of the leading survival experts in the USA and his wife, Ruth England, has extensive experience working alongside Mykel in countless survival situations. Dean Laplonge is a safety communications expert with a wealth of experience in the resource sector. Our all-star team will deliver credible and effective survival training to your organization. Click on picture for a full bio.
Mykel is a leading survival expert and former Green Beret.
Mykel's role is to develop and deliver the survival training.
Mykel Hawke is a U.S. Army Special Forces "Green Beret" combat veteran with over 20 years of experience working in security, medical, communications, and intelligence for the military, government, corporate, and commercial media sectors. His military training includes Special Forces survival, resistance, evasion and escape, and negotiation techniques. He has worked as a warzone contractor and project manager in places such as Colombia, Sierra Leone, and Iraq. In 1998, Hawke was awarded the United States Department of State Small Contractor of the Year award for his services to the United Nations & United States Embassy in Haiti. He has a Masters of Science in psychology (University of California) and a Baccalaureate of Science in biology (University of the State of New York). Mykel is the star of The Travel Channel's series Lost Survivors, and formerly starred in Discovery Channel's hit shows Man Woman Wild and One Man Army, as well as The Outdoor Channel's Elite Tactical Unit. Hawke is the bestselling author of the two critically acclaimed survival manuals, Hawke's Special Forces Survival Handbook and Hawke's Green Beret Survival Manual.
Ruth is an experienced survival trainer with extensive media training.
Ruth's role is to help develop and deliver the survival training.
Ruth England is a primitive survival instructor whose survival and travel work has been carried out in more than 30 different terrains and 100 locations throughout the world. As part of her public career as a TV reporter and photographer, she has spent much of the last twenty years working abroad, often in remote and dangerous places in developing nations. She has worked in regions with minimal social infrastructure assets and without access to medical facilities and doctors. She is adept at expedition planning and survival techniques, and certified in wilderness first aid. Ruth also has extensive experience providing media and corporate communications, including filming and photography. Companies she has worked for include British Petroleum, Petroleum Geo-Services, Barclays Bank, British Airways, Motorola, Associated Newspapers, Alexander Forbes Risk Services, Royal and Sun Alliance, Department of Employment, DTI, The Royal Bank of Scotland, Lloyds TSB, and the UK Post Office. She holds a Bachelors degree in photography, film and video (University of Westminster), and postgraduate qualifications in digital media (University of Middlesex). Ruth was Mykel's co-star on Discovery Channel's hit show Man Woman Wild. She is currently writing a book on survival skills for families.
Dean is an experienced safety communications expert.
Dean's role is to provide expertise on risks faced by employees working in the resources sector, and help integrate our survival training into our clients' safety programs.
Dean Laplonge has an extensive career working in the areas of safety, communications, and gender in resource industries. He has made significant contributions to the development of new safety and leadership workplace projects for companies such as BHP Billiton, Rio Tinto, and Worsley Alumina. Dean has a doctorate in Cultural Studies (Curtin University) and a second Masters in Sustainable Peace in the Contemporary World (University for Peace). He has carried out extensive research exploring the links between safety and communications, and safety and gender; and his research papers have been published in the International Journal of Oil, Gas and Coal Technology and The Journal of Health, Safety and Environment. As a result of his consulting work and research, Dean developed the innovative workplace program MySafe which encourages companies to appreciate the important impact safety communications can have on employee safety. His latest book, So you think you're tough: Getting serious about gender in mining, also provides practical advice for safety professionals to help them understand how gender impacts on safety behaviors at work.
The resource sector is facing increased risks from civil unrest and extreme weather events. Industry safety and security programs often fail to deliver the basic skills training that would help employees survive an extreme situation in a hostile environment before help arrives. We can help bridge that training gap with highly effective survival skills training, customized to suit your business needs and operating environment.
Violent attacks against resource extraction operations are unfortunately becoming an all-too familiar news story.
From domestic terrorism, to suicide bombings, hostage-taking, and acts of sabotage across Africa, the Middle East, and Asia, resource operations and their employees are increasingly under attack. Extreme weather events are also on the rise, causing more flooding, landslides, wild fires, and drought.
For the resources sector these all translate into increased risk of damage to vital infrastructure and equipment, and constitute a heightened threat to the safety of employees.
The Hawke-EST blog offers in-depth articles and research which explore the extreme situation risks facing the resources sector today, and advice on how resource companies can better prepare their employees to face the life-threatening challenges of these risks.
Tell me more
Resource companies are typically too narrowly focused on managing predictable day-to-day safety hazards in the workplace.
The scary fact is that routine hazards aren't the only threat to your employees' safety. What if the controlled workplace environment is subject to a sudden terrorist attack, environmental disaster, or other extreme and unpredictable situation? What if your employees need to flee their work site or if they are left to fend for themselves in hostile terrain?
Our training focuses on providing operation-specific survival skills so your employees will be psychologically and physically prepared to deal with an extreme situation where they live and work.
Tell me more
Our expert survival trainers will provide your employees with the skills they need to survive an extreme situation.
We will tailor the survival training to ensure it is relevant to the specific survival needs of your employees in their operating environment, and to respond to the risks of extreme situations most likely to occur in that environment. Common topics included in extreme situation survival training are:
We can also perform a gap assessment with your safety and security personnel to ensure the extreme situation survival training complements existing programs and policies.
A range of survival training tools and equipment including medical and food factsheets specific to the workplace environment, survival equipment (e.g., knives, bug out bags), and communications (e.g., videos, training guides) are available to complement our training.
To arrange a FREE consultation with our survival team complete our contact form and we will be in touch.
Tell me more
Survival training courses can be run at a range of domestic and international locations.
Survival training can be delivered in domestic or international settings depending on the location of your business sites, or we can arrange for the training to be carried out at one of our training facilities in Texas.
The training can be delivered pre-departure to help prepare your employees for the risks they will face in their future workplace. It can also be provided in the field to allow your employees to experience a simulated extreme situation right where they work.
Contact us for a free consultation to discuss your requirements.
Tell me moreContact
us
today!
This archive of news headlines highlights some of the extreme situations that resource industry employees around the world have had to face in recent times. Tragically, in many cases the organizations and individuals concerned were not adequately prepared for what was about to unfold.
Contact us for a free consultation to discuss your requirements.
