Part 3 of 3: AtlasIED & Pentegra Team Up in Chicago O’Hare with David Injeski, Daniel McGlathery, Justin Young, and Gina Sansivero

Long, complex projects require expertise, patience, resilience, and tenacity to get the job done. This is especially true when the project involves using advanced technology and customized equipment.

In this third and final installment of the Sounds Like Success podcast series focused on the O’Hare Airport project, Gina Sansivero, VP Marketing & Corporate Communication at AtlasIED, spoke with Justin Young, General Manager at Atlas IED; David Injeski, Design Engineer at Pentegra Systems; and Daniel McGlathery, Engineering Supervisor at Pentegra Systems, about how collaboration and the need to adapt to unforeseen challenges are keys to success in these complex projects.

Despite working on airport projects for about 40 years, there were a lot of firsts for AtlasIED in this O’Hare story, including the creation of a completely new digital mike station. Young spoke to the challenges of creating custom engineering builds in this space noting that 5-10% of every project requires work specific to the individual airports.

“And that’s where AtlasIED sets itself apart because we live in that space,” Young said. “That’s where we have made our name over the years, and it’s one of the things we wear as a badge of honor is being able to take that last 5, 10% and be able to tailor a specific solution to each and every customer.”

In addition to custom requirements, solutions need to be scalable. This is especially true of O’Hare’s requirements as they have big plans of expanding over time to include the development of a new international terminal. With the first stage of the project completed, the guests discussed the challenges of these innovative and future-forward projects.

“There’s a reason that only a select few are doing this sort of thing because it can be really challenging,” Injeski said. “You have to be fearless at times, and you have to be willing to take chances knowing that you can eventually solve the problem. And you’re going to take some hits along the way. You’re going to make mistakes.”

Everyone agrees that the challenges are real. So are the rewards. How partners work together and solve problems along the way is a massive indicator of future success. McGlathery reflected on how AtlasIED enables Pentegra to be a great partner for O’Hare in maintaining its new PA system.

“A lot of the items are simple fixes, and we’ll just go out and take care of them,” McGlathery said. “But there is a lot of stuff that is a little more advanced, and we need support with. When I’m on site, I’ll just put a call into AtlasIED, and they’ve got a group of staff that are there and ready to answer the phone calls. They’re experts and they can jump in and take a look. With me onsite and them remote, we can pretty much troubleshoot anything.” This is in addition to scheduled maintenance and tests to ensure systems and equipment are running properly.

“There is a partnership there where we do some of it, they do some of it, but we’re always working together on it. It’s a team effort, and the support from the factory is superb, and they’ve really shined and given us the support we need to keep it up,” McGlathery said.