When a building fails, Randy Still’s RanDrew Consulting wants to help figure out why
The word “forensics” conjures up images of CSI-type investigations and projects surrounded by drama. And while forensic structural engineering isn’t quite that glamorous, it has its own appeal.
Earlier this month, Randy Still announced plans to form RanDrew Consulting, a forensic structural engineering company that will concentrate on the investigation and analysis of building component failure with an emphasis on defense litigation and insurance claims.
Forensic structural engineering is “all those things that hold up a building, like the floors you walk on and where you hang sheetrock,” says Still – looking at the way things should be designed and seeing if it matches up to what was actually designed.
With a Bachelor of Science degree in engineering from the University of South Carolina, Still likes to dig into the ways structures are put together. He has over 30 years’ experience, with the past 15 in forensic structural engineering. Still was a former principal at H2L and spent time as an associate with O’Neal, both large engineering firms in Greenville.
He fondly remembers an early project where he had to go out to a horse barn that had collapsed. It was a wooden structure covered with snow with a lot of farm equipment inside. Based on his report, a full investigation was conducted and Still was proud that he had input into that.
Still named the company after his two sons, Randall and Drew. Drew, his youngest son, died in May. Drew had wanted to be an engineer like his dad and had even been accepted into the engineering program at Lenoir-Rhyne University. “This seemed like a good way to remember and memorialize something he wanted to be involved in,” Still said. Still also wanted to be “captain of his own ship” and “to do things that are right, proper and effective.”
While there are a lot of different engineering practices in Greenville and South Carolina, RanDrew is only one of about 20 firms in South Carolina that do these types of evaluations. “It’s just not a widespread discipline,” Still explained.
A majority of his business comes from insurance companies and attorneys. For someone who files an insurance claim but is told by an insurance adjuster that nothing is wrong, RanDrew can help settle the issue by providing a comprehensive third-party evaluation.
Technology plays a large role in the business, Still said, and having the correct computer software is important. “Forensics is more based on the preparation of legal documents that can stand up in court,” he said. Documents have to be timely and easily understood. Still also uses moisture meters and digital cameras daily, and said that it’s important in this line of work to use those tools properly.
Still currently has two employees and as business progresses he’d like to bring on a new apprentice engineer. So far business has been good, and Still said that he just wants to provide his clients the best possible engineering service.
“I just want the company to last forever,” he said, “so my son’s name is remembered.”
