Three leading fire engineers join Hydrock, now Stantec

We’re delighted to welcome Arturo De Paola, Charles Betts and Timothy Liu (left to right) to the Hydrock, now Stantec family.

All three are chartered engineers and bring a wealth of senior experience to our fire safety team. These key positions within the fire safety senior management team, will support our Divisional Director James McNay in building relationships with key clients and strategically supporting the division’s growth and innovation.

Arturo de Paola joins as our National Director for External Wall Fire Safety, leading our offering and enhancing how this work is carried out. Based in our London office, he is a specialist fire and structural chartered engineer, chartered building surveyor and building safety assurance specialist.

Bringing his expertise in external walls, he will be focusing on developing seven regional teams of highly qualified fire engineers, and our National Fire Risk Management team, ready to undertake external wall analyses and appraisals, BSI PAS 9980 basic and in-depth assessments, intrusive surveys and reports.

Charles Betts is our new National Fire Engineering Lead, further developing the engineering skills of our fire safety team. He is responsible for leading a team of 70 skilled engineers across nine offices with the aim of enabling strategic growth. Also based in London, he is a chartered fire engineer with significant experience in large mixed-use projects.

In previous roles, he has project managed and developed integrated fire strategies for major developments across London from concept stage to handover, including the redevelopment of the BBC Television Centre in White City, multiple schemes on the Canary Wharf site and the Design Museum.

As National Technical Director, Timothy Liu will set the technical benchmark for our fire engineering offering, along with supporting our complex projects.

Based in Manchester, Timothy brings more than 20 years of fire engineering experience across a range of sectors including residential, retail, office and transport.

He specialises in computational modelling, smoke control and structural fire engineering, and can advise on the best overall fire strategy for special projects.

Our divisional director for fire safety, James McNay, said:

“We’re very excited to welcome Arturo, Charles and Timothy to the team. They’ve hit the ground running, already contributing valuable insights through their knowledge, experience and unique skills.

"Their senior presence will fuel our next chapter as a division, while enabling us to continue to improve the quality of people’s lives, from looking after our growing team to helping communities feel safer in their homes.”