Training For API, CWI, NDT, Upstream, Midstream, Downstream

About Us

Get to know the team behind Atlas API Training

Our Story

Onsite Training

In 2014, after 65 years of combined engineering experience in the petro-chemical and power industries, Hannon McLeod and Oran Lewis recognized how important providing a more convenient way to train and acquire industry certifications and advanced education qualifications in these industries – This led to the development of Atlas API Training LLC. Atlas turned the tables on the industry standard and ended the expensive tedium of travelling to specific locations to take the courses with the development of a convenient online format that saves time and money. Over the past two years Atlas has received multiple request to expand their offering of advanced API certifications and is now developing additional industry specific training courses that will soon be available.

Atlas API Training was started with quality, value, and convenience in mind. Our online training courses are designed to give the API students the best opportunity to pass the certification exam. The goal is to provide that opportunity in the most convenient manner possible. All course courses are frequently updated to reflect the most current industry specific changes and testing parameters.

Meet The Team

Hannon McLeod Marketing, Co-Founder

Hannon McLeod Marketing, Co-Founder

He attended the University of Southern Mississippi to pursue a Bachelor’s degree in business administration. He has worked as a welder, inspector, and supervisor in the power, paper, oil, gas, and chemical industries. He has worked projects all over the United States and several other countries in Central and South America. In the years that he has been involved in these industries the importance of proper certification has continued to rise. More and more employers are requiring their employees to be certified.

OT Lewis Instructor, Co-Founder

OT Lewis Instructor, Co-Founder

Oran T. Lewis (OT) holds a degree in mathematics and he has worked in the welding & inspection field for more than 37 years. He prepared and presents the API 510 and API 570 courses. His teaching career began in 1990 when he taught the API 510 at San Jacinto College. He has assisted in the creation of some of the questions used in the actual exams. Past and present certifications held by Mr. Lewis include NBIC Commission, API 570, API 510, AWS CWI, Level 1 NACE Corrosion, and various NDE certifications. He has co-authored two books with Dr. Maurice Stewart. Their books are available on Amazon:

  • Heat Exchanger Equipment Field Manual: Common Operating Problems and Practical Solutions
  • Pressure Vessels Field Manual: Common Operating Problems and Practical Solutions
Jaco Nel, Instructor

Jaco Nel Instructor

He attended the University of Southern Mississippi to pursue a Bachelor’s degree in business administration. He has worked as a welder, inspector, and supervisor in the power, paper, oil, gas, and chemical industries. He has worked projects all over the UniJaco Nel has 18 years of experience in Olefins manufacturing at South Africa’s biggest petrochemical company. He has extensive experience in distillation, absorption, drying and heat exchange on a cryogenic separation unit. Combined with this, Jaco has substantial experience of all types of compressors and steam turbines. He has been involved in pipe line commissioning and routine pigging, as well as 4 successive major plant turnarounds (as project leader). For the last 6 years he has been Plant Manager on an Olefins cracker unit. As plant manager, Jaco has conducted numerous incident investigations in conjunction with the reliability team, and has implemented several business improvement processes. He is currently Process Safety Management (PSM) champion for Emergency Response.

Gilbert Torres, Instructor

Gilbert Torres Instructor

Gilbert Torres is an ASNT NDT Level III, a member of the American Society for Nondestructive Testing (ASNT) and is a proud veteran of the United States Army. He served as Combat Medic while serving in the U.S. Army and earned the prestigious Expert Field Medical Badge. He was also chosen as an instructor for the Combat Lifesaver Course and AHA CPR Instructor courses. He exited the U.S. Army with an Honorable Discharge and held a position as a Nationally Registered EMT for a private ambulance service until an injury led him to transition into the NDT industry. He got his start by specializing in Ultrasonic Testing then slowly branched out to other NDT Methods including Magnetic Particle Testing (MT), Liquid Dye Penetrant Testing (PT) and Visual Testing (VT). He has over 20 years of Oilfield experience and has received awards for his academic achievements throughout college as well as for speaking at AWS (American Welding Society) conferences.

Gilbert Torres is well known in the NDT industry and was even asked by ASNT to review and revised portions of the Ultrasonic Testing training manual. His teaching style has made it possible for him relay information in simple terms without taking away from the content. He encourages participation by students and is always eager to answer questions from students and to address any comments and concerns. He considers teaching a privilege and works hard to keep the content interesting.

Sarah Compton, Instructor

Sarah Compton Instructor

Sarah Compton earned her B.S. and M.S. in geology at IUPUI. She earned her PhD in geology with a focus on geodynamics at the University of Alabama, intending to grow her talent and passion for teaching with a career in academia. After an internship with Swift Energy introduced her to the industry, she switched gears to become a petroleum geologist, but never lost sight of her passion for teaching, which was grown during her tenure as an instructor at IUPUI and teaching assistant at the University of Alabama. During her time in the industry, she was exposed to 3-D seismic interpretation and built, then used, a basin modeling tool from scratch in Excel using published literature. Eventually landing at Noble Energy in Denver, she drilled over 35 horizontal wells and discovered inefficiencies in completion methods by analyzing cutting-edge, fiber optic down-hole data. She currently works as a contract geologist with Palomar Natural Resources as their only in-house domestic geologist.

Kourosh Kian, Instructor

Kourosh Kian Instructor

HKourosh (Cyrus) Kian is a Ph.D. student in the Chemical and Petroleum Engineering at the University of Kansas. He has worked as a Research Assistant with Tertiary Oil Recovery Program, where he focused on CO2 EOR / storage. He has taken on different projects including: performing a case study on the fluid behavior, recovery mechanisms, feasibility of CO2 EOR, and simulation of Arbuckle reservoir in the state of Kansas. He has worked on multiple industrial projects such as challenges and opportunities of production of gas hydrates, hydraulic fracturing in the US, and Compressed Air Energy Storage (CAES) in South East US with leading companies such as Southern Company.
He received his Bachelor's degree in petroleum engineering from Petroleum University of Technology (Ahwaz, Iran), and a Master's degree in petroleum engineering from Amirkabir University of Technology (Tehran, Iran). He has a Master's degree in MBA with a focus on corporate finance and international business, from the University of Kansas. Prior to starting his Ph.D., Cyrus worked as a field engineer for Schlumberger. Currently, he is working as a system analysts for GE.

Timothy (Marc) Henry, Instructor

Timothy (Marc) Henry Instructor

His profession in the Education Industry started 25 plus years ago after a bad vehicle accident that led me to a good experience of teaching and developing full time. Since then he taught at various colleges and developed and taught courses for many major corporations around the world. His specialty is in the field and my degree is Applied Sciences, where I teach Automotive, Diesel Hydraulics and Pneumatics. He also teaches Electricity, PLC systems, and anything to do with flow, including Refrigeration.

Over the last seven plus years Marc has been teaching for the Offshore Oil Industry and now has become a specialist in Drill String, Crown Mounted Compensation and Riser Tensioning Systems, studying and teaching in this field has been fascinating. He spent two years in Norway to get his Subsea Engineering Certificate for the Oil and Gas Industry. He also teaches Down Hole Drilling courses, Human Machine Interface Systems with Robotic Controls, Drill Floor Equipment on 6th Generation Rigs and Well Control. Marc is continuously developing courses and always learning. This is why he likes teaching so much, because nothing stays the same and we must always keep up with technology.

Billee Shane Gordon, Instructor

Billee Shane Gordon Instructor

Shane started his 22 years of experience in Oil and Gas refining facilities, Chemical plants, and Fossil Fuel Power Generating facilities as a Graduated Apprentice Union Boilermaker. He has intimate knowledge of Power Boilers, Heat Exchangers, Pressure Vessels, and associated piping. He has worked for the last 15 years in those facilities as a Construction Quality Manager, in the Western Basin of Lake Erie, from St. Claire, MI to Cleveland, OH as well as the Gulf Coast from New Orleans, LA to Corpus Christi, TX. Having performed Quality Management in a vast number of facilities for numerous clients, he has a very deep insight to what the clients want to see form their construction company and it’s Inspection Team. This experience has lead him to become a member of ASME B13.3 Sub-Committee for Fabrication, Examination and Testing. In this Sub-Committee he works as project manager over changes to the Code in aspects related to Fab, Exam, and Testing. He is also a seated member of ASME B31.3 Section Committee where he votes on changes throughout the entirety of the Code. This insight helps him stay up to date with changes to all of ASME’s Codes. He also uses his background to consult on major projects where Welding/ASME Code background/NBIC Compliance/Fabrication Processes are all factors.
Shane has been an AWS-CWI and AWS-CRI for many years and still uses these credentials on a daily basis. The fact that he has in the past held level II certifications in many NDE processes also helps in planning projects from a quality aspect. When companies have issues in these departments, many of them pick up the phone and call Mr. Gordon for solutions. He plans to use that experience to form classes and teach these classes in a manner that all of the business can understand and follow, from Engineers, to Experienced Quality Personnel, to Welders alike.

Isaac Thibodeaux, Instructor

Originally from Youngsville, Louisiana, Issac first worked in the nondestructive testing industries beginning in 2000. For the first 7 years of my career he worked in several different sectors of the oil and gas industry. He spent some time in paper mills, offshore, chemical plants, and Refineries. The majority of this time was spent offshore. During this time Issac received his level II certifications in MT, PT, RT, UTT, VT, and film interpretation and during the next 8 years acquired API 510, 570, and 653 certifications. During his 15 years in the industry he has held many titles, which include: Level II inspector, API independent contractor, NDT Manager, RSO (Radiation Safety Officer), Chevron USA Gulf of Mexico business unit western shelf asset integrity coordinator. He has been teaching 40-hour radiation safety classes for the last 5years. He has focused a lot of his time studying damage mechanisms associated with the offshore sector. In his years at Chevron he saw a great need for a more focused inspection, based on specific damage mechanisms. His goal is to use my knowledge to help prevent unexpected down time and better planning of required repairs by using a proactive inspection approach versus a reactive approach. Isaac has a passion for helping people get into the inspection industry.

Marlon Cox Oil & Gas Instructor

Marlon Cox, President of MVC Consulting, LLC, is the owner and operator of a third party Inspection and Engineering Consulting Company for over 20 years. Mr. Cox currently works for a clientele list that includes; Atlas API Training, EUCI, D&C Inspection, Inc., ABS Consulting, Inc., HPi VS, Inc., DNV GL, Inc., Gulf Industrial Services, Inc. Marlon is performing Aramco and other Oil, Gas and Utility Power plant related inspections, educational teaching, online educational courses and consulting services. Marlon worked as a pipefitter, oil & Natural gas pipeline welder, boiler tube and structural steel welder for many years before continuing his education. Marlon has worked for over 40 years as an Electrical-Mechanical Engineer, Utility Power Generation Technician and Field Engineer. Marlon has also worked as a Nuclear Inspector Level II Mechanical, Electrical, Welding, I&C, Concrete and NACE Inspector and Nuclear Dry Fuel Storage Inspector. Marlon holds NDE Inspection Certifications including ASME B31.1-B31.3 VT, MT & PT as well as the European EU PED for pressure vessels, pipe and valves. Marlon earned his Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering in 1997, and a Masters degree in Electrical Engineering in Boise, ID in 2012. Marlon has worked as a Nuclear Valve technician at V.C. Summer, Indian Point and Vermont Yankee Nuclear power plants. He has also worked as a Nuclear Inspector Level II Mechanical, Electrical, Welding, I&C Concrete and NACE Inspector at V.C. Summer, DC Cook, Seabrook Nuclear, and Columbia Nuclear Generating Plants.

Marlon is currently working on several power production projects and also teaches engineering courses overseas for various clients in the Oil, Gas and Nuclear Industries.

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