Derrick A. Bachtel, PE
Chief Electrical Engineer, Fueling & Ramp Services
Burns & McDonnell
Date of Birth: 12-8-1974
Years in Aviation: 15
Derrick Bachtel, PE, grew up in a town of 400 people. He was 15 years old when his aunts took him on a flight to Hawaii. That trip was a defining moment for him and he’s had the aviation bug ever since.
Bachtel joined Burns & McDonnell’s employee-owner team in 1998 as an assistant electrical engineer in the Fueling & Ramp Services Group within the Aviation Practice. Today, as chief electrical engineer, he is responsible for overseeing the electrical, instrumentation and controls associated with more than $100 million construction per year worldwide. Experienced in aviation design and construction, he has been a driving force in developing new, innovative technologies for commercial and military fueling facilities, including the adaptation of variable frequency drive motors for fuel pumping systems, cutting-edge communication technologies for fuel storage tank monitoring and emergency fuel shutoff systems for airport hydrant fueling.
Bachtel has experienced the aviation industry through service to airport authorities, sponsor cities, major commercial airlines, cargo airlines and the U. S. military. He has provided facility improvement master plan studies, design-bid-build and design-build services to deliver jet fuel systems, passenger boarding bridges, preconditioned air systems, 400-Hz power and glycol deicing systems.
He is currently leading automatic tank gauging replacement projects at Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport and Kansas City International Airport; capital improvement projects at Honolulu International Airport’s operating storage and off-site storage facilities; and emergency fuel shutoff system installation at Chicago O’Hare International Airport.
Some of Bachtel’s past work includes greenfield fueling receipt and storage facility projects; power and controls system retrofits; passenger boarding bridge (PBB) power and point-of-use 400Hz ground power units; Type I and Type IV glycol receipt, storage and blending facilities; and spent aircraft deicing fluid collection and analysis.
Bachtel is a licensed professional engineer in Missouri and California. He earned his Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering with a minor in Physics from Missouri University of Science and Technology, and a Master of Science in Electrical Engineering from the University of Kansas.
His recommendations to people entering the design-build project world is that when trying to keep multiple entities happy it’s important to remember that “the people who talk loudest aren’t the most correct. I would groom a new person to listen to the multiple opinions to gather assessments and to continue to ask questions if it didn’t feel right.”
