Don Fry

Don Fry AO is an Australian engineer, company director, entrepreneur and philanthropist.

NQEA

Fry is Owner & Chairman of AIMTEK (formerly NQEA Australia Pty Ltd, formerly North Queensland Engineers and Agents Pty Ltd), started by his father in 1948 in Cairns, Queensland as a general engineering company contracting to the mining industry, then diversified. Fry started his apprenticeship as a Fitter and Turner with NQEA.

Under Fry's direction, NQEA later entered the boat building and maintenance industry, and won the contract to build the 14 Australian follow-on 42m Fremantle Class patrol boats for the Royal Australian Navy that entered service in the 1980s, then provided maintenance for the ships. NQEA later built and maintained luxury pleasure boats.

NQEA has built: • Automatic road to rail Bin Transfer System • Continuous 'A' grade Fugal for the separation of molasses from sugar • Semi-Swath Passenger/Vehicle Catamaran • Low Wash Ferries operating in Sydney, Tahiti, Holland, Nigeria and London • Automatic Docking Systems • Coffee and Tea Harvesters • Bauxite washing facilities • Coal loading conveyor systems and bucket wheel reclaimers • Semi-submersible Reef Viewer • 100 tonne Ship ‘Travellift’ and associated infrastructure. • 27 fully automatic Bagasse Storage and Reclaim Systems in Fiji, Jamaica, NSW & Queensland • First silica sand processing, stockpile, wharf and ship-loading facility at Cape Flattery • Landing craft • 30 tonne bollard pull tugs • Prawn trawlers • Luxury passenger ferry for Hayman Island • 22 work boats for the RAN & Australian Army • 8 Work Boats for the PNG Government • 14 Fremantle class Patrol Craft for the RAN • 6 low wash ferries for Sydney, numerous fast ferries for Queensland tourist operators • 5,000 tonne deadweight slip hopper powered barge • Luxury yachts for Australian and US clients • 3,000 tonne deadweight ore carrier - fitted with a fully automatic filling and discharge system and autodocking system • Fast ferries and hovercraft exported to PNG, Japan, New Zealand, Kuwait, Yugoslavia, Singapore, Malaysia, Taiwan, Canada, England, Seychelles, Angola and Holland.

Hypersonics

The Australian Defence Force Academy in Canberra, Australian Capital Territory contracted NQEA to build a complete ground testing hypersonics test chamber to a design developed by him.

In 2004 NQEA built a nozzle for a scramjet (supersonic combustion ramjet engine) to be tested by the University of Queensland ground test facility, the T4 tunnel. Fry has been designated as an Adjunct Professor of the University's School of Engineering.

Community involvement

Besides his business and scientific interests, Don Fry chairs Australia’s national committee advising the Government of Australia on homelessness.

He is chair of the James Cook University Engineering Advisory Board.

Fry is a recipient of the Institution of Engineers Australia highest National award. He was the inaugural recipient of the Queensland Division Hall of Fame.

Fry has also been inducted into the Queensland University of Technology Hall of Fame for Outstanding Constructors.

He is Patron of the FNQ Independent Living Support Assoc. Inc, a longtime board member of Lifeline^{[disambiguation needed ]} Cairns, and has been for 30 years member of the Cairns Salvation Army Advisory Board.

In 2006 he was appointed a special trustee for ensuring the allocation of funds under the federal government's Cyclone Larry assistance package.

Awards

• 2006 - named among the Top 100 Australia's Most Influential Engineers ^[1] in Australia.

External links

• Engineers Australia profile

References

1. ^ Top 100 Australia's Most Influential Engineers Engineers Australia, Vol 78 No 6 COVER STORY, JUNE 2006

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