INTERNATIONAL CANINE SPILL & LEAK DETECTION - Key Persons

Dr. Ed Owens

Job Titles:
  • Member of the Board of Directors
  • Scientific Advisor
  • President of Owens Coastal Consults
Dr. Ed Owens is President of Owens Coastal Consults (OCC) and the Owens Response Group (ORG) International. He has over 45 years of experience in marine and inland oil spill response and training worldwide, and was the Technical Advisor to Exxon USA for the Shoreline Response to the T/V Exxon Valdez, during which he developed the Shoreline Cleanup Assessment Technique (SCAT) concept, and for BP's shoreline response to the Deepwater Horizon incident. Dr. Owens has worked on spill-related coastal and river/inland projects throughout North and South America and the Middle East, as well as Australia, New Zealand, Russia, and the Caspian and has conducted oil spill related missions for the UN, the IMO, GI-WACAF, the World Bank, and the EBRD. Dr. Owens has been active throughout his career on spill-related R&D projects, including recent studies on oil detection canines and the use of UASs for shoreline surveys.

Dwayne Farris

Job Titles:
  • Vice President of the Board of Directors
  • Owner of Black Creek K - 9 Pipeline Detection LLC
Dwayne Farris is the owner of Black Creek K-9 Pipeline Detection LLC. He served in the United States Marine Corps as a Military Police Officer receiving assignment as a Military Working Dog handler. Upon honorable completion of active duty he continued as a reservist for the U.S. Marine Corps Military Police Detachment located in Wahpeton, North Dakota as a squad leader and was promoted to the rank of Staff Sergeant. He has served in multiple operational canine positions including: Explosives, Narcotics, Patrol, Tracking handler/Kennel Master/Program Management; Presidential Dignitary Protection details; Operation Golden Spear Nairobi, Kenya; Operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom; Multi-Modal, Surface and Aviation Security organizations. He was Master K-9 Trainer at Joint Base Lewis-McChord (JBLM), Washington, as the Multi-Purpose Canine (MPC) Trainer for a Special Operations unit Dwayne was employed by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) as the Regional Canine Coordinator for Region 5 based in Seattle, WA. as the field-based Supervisory Subject Matter Expert (SME) assigned regionally to oversee all National Explosive Detection Canine Training Program (NEDCTP) assigned canine teams. He also served as a Regional Canine Training Instructor (RCTI) for the NEDCTP for the Pacific Northwest. He has a Master of Arts-Management from University of Phoenix and Master of Arts-Management/Human Resource Management from American Public University. Dwayne is married to my wife Leah and have 4 children; Haley, Brandon, Griffin and Rayna.

Paul Bunker

Job Titles:
  • Consultant
  • President of the Board of Directors
Paul Bunker served in the British Army as a Canine Trainer/Instructor/Assessor for over 22 years. During this time, he was the Senior Instructor/Trainer of Mine Detection Dog/Handler Training for both UK and US Military at the UK Defence Animal Centre. He developed new training techniques and methodologies that are now considered internationally standard training practice. Mr. Bunker's methodology resulted in specialized detection dog teams achieving independently validated certification standards of 100% detection rate. Based on this experience and lessons learned he developed protocols and techniques for imprinting and training canines in sub-surface target detection. He was the lead trainer responsible for the development and training of Oil Detection Canines. Having proven the concept of sub-surface oil detection capabilities of trained canines he developed utilization and deployment protocols. The development is a proven capability in both scientific research and operational spill response projects. He deployed with Oil Detection Canine Teams to spill responses on coastal shorelines and inland waterways in the USA and Canada. Credited with developing the off-leash boat controlled Oil Detection Canine Team for utilization on inland waterways. He has presented at Arctic and Marine Oilspill Program Technical Seminar on Environmental Contamination and Response conference on Oil Detection Canine utilization and certifications. In addition as been a regular at Clean Gulf to include providing demonstrations of Oil Detection Canine capability. Mr Bunker is a canine consultant and the owner of Chiron-K9 LLC, a company specifically focusing on canine detection and special projects. His canine partner is Nika, a black female Labrador trained as an Oil Detection Canine.