About

Family-owned. Brisbane-based. Spatial intelligence specialists for 23 years.

Orbital Underground Service Location has been operating in South East Queensland for more than two decades — the longest-tenured locating business many of our engineering and consulting clients have worked with. We have spent that time deliberately becoming a spatial-intelligence specialist rather than a generic locator.

Founded and led by Jamie Ware. CERTLOC certified. NULCA member. In strategic alliance with Vac2U for non-destructive excavation.

The business

Orbital was established to do one thing well: tell engineers, asset owners, builders and architects exactly what is under the ground before they design, dig or build. Twenty-three years on, we have deliberately expanded that scope to include above-ground capture — drone photogrammetry, point cloud, contour and structure survey — because the same buyers now expect a single coordinated spatial deliverable rather than a stack of fragmented field outputs.

The operating model is built around three commitments that have not changed since day one:

  • The deliverable is the product. The field work is how the deliverable is produced. We invest where the deliverable lives — CAD, point cloud, structured report — not just where the boots are.
  • Documentation is not optional. Every job ends with traceable records — AS 5488 quality-level designation per feature, photographs, survey coordinates, methodology statements. We work to a standard our clients’ compliance auditors are happy to see.
  • Specialisation beats coverage. We do not pretend to own everything. Where physical excavation is needed, we work with Vac2U. Where the client needs equipment, we resell Radiodetection. Where they need certification, we work to CERTLOC, NULCA and AS 5488. The job benefits when each capability is owned by the operator who is best at it.

Jamie Ware — Founder and Managing Director

Jamie Ware, founder and managing director of Orbital

Jamie spent thirteen years in the Australian Army in a technical-trade specialisation. That period embedded the operating discipline that still runs through Orbital — formal documentation, methodical preparation, accountable delivery, a refusal to call a job done before the records say it is.

Twenty-three years in locating has placed Jamie in a small group of long-tenured spatial-data operators in South East Queensland. He has been on the ground through the entire arc of the discipline: from when “locating” meant two cans of paint and a clipboard, through the introduction of AS 5488 as the Australian standard, into the current era of GNSS RTK, CAD-native deliverables and reality-capture point clouds.

He has also trained a number of the locators currently working across South East Queensland. If you have hired locating services in this market over the last decade, there is a reasonable chance the locator on your job picked up the methodology — directly or one step removed — from Jamie. The original-source advantage matters: techniques, methodology and judgement are passed on intact, not reverse-engineered from someone else’s marks.

Outside Orbital, Jamie served for fourteen years on the board of one of Brisbane’s independent schools, including six and a half years as chairman. The governance discipline that role demanded — risk frameworks, audit trails, financial accountability, evidence-based decision making — is the same discipline that shapes how Orbital documents and delivers a project. It is one of the reasons our deliverables sit comfortably in engineering and council compliance chains.

I spent thirteen years in the Army learning that field work without documentation is just storytelling. The deliverable is the proof that the job was done properly. That principle still runs the business.

Jamie Ware

Credentials and certifications

CERTLOC certified locating organisation

CERTLOC is the recognised Australian industry certification for utility location. Orbital is a certified organisation and our locators hold individual CERTLOC credentials. The certification covers methodology, safety, equipment competence and ongoing professional development.

NULCA member

National Utility Locating Contractors Association. Jamie has been an active member through the period in which NULCA built the standards now in use across the Australian utility-locating industry.

Radiodetection authorised dealer

We are an authorised reseller of Radiodetection locating and inspection equipment in Australia. The relationship goes both ways: we run Radiodetection’s market-leading gear on our own jobs because it is the most capable equipment for the work, and we sell that equipment into the locating market because we know what it can do under real Queensland field conditions.

AS 5488-aligned across all four quality levels

We work to AS 5488 quality levels QL-A, QL-B, QL-C and QL-D as standard on every commercial engagement, designating each located service to the appropriate level and documenting the methodology used to reach it.

Construction induction + Blue Card

Our staff have completed general construction induction training, hold Construction Safety Cards, and hold positive Blue Card notices for work in environments where child safety is a consideration.

Alliance with Vac2U

Orbital and Vac2U have structured a deliberate strategic alliance. Vac2U is South East Queensland’s leading hydro vacuum excavation specialist, operating a fleet from 3,000-litre units up to the 10,000-litre Thor across Brisbane, the Gold Coast, the Sunshine Coast, Toowoomba and Northern New South Wales. Where our work requires non-destructive excavation — QL-A verification on AS 5488 jobs, exposing services for as-built confirmation, supporting build-over applications — Vac2U is how it gets done safely.

The alliance lets each business stay focused on what it does best. Orbital owns the spatial intelligence — locating, surveying, designating, documenting, delivering CAD. Vac2U owns the excavation — fleet, crew, safety system, technique. The client receives one coordinated engagement, with no compromise on either side.

Where we work

Orbital is based in Sheldon, south of Brisbane. We deliver across:

  • Brisbane metro and inner suburbs
  • Gold Coast and the Northern Gold Coast corridor
  • Sunshine Coast
  • Logan, Ipswich, Redlands and surrounds
  • Toowoomba and Western Queensland on project-based engagements
  • Northern New South Wales on coordinated jobs with Vac2U

For larger commercial scopes outside this catchment, we mobilise on a project-by-project basis. Tell us where the work is and we’ll come back with a fixed-price scope.

What we don’t do — and why that matters

Generic services businesses tend to expand horizontally to capture more work. Orbital deliberately doesn’t. We say no to:

  • Owning vacuum excavation trucks. That’s Vac2U’s specialisation. Owning a half-decent fleet of our own would dilute focus and produce a worse outcome for the client. The alliance is the correct answer.
  • Pretending to be a general civil contractor. We don’t dig trenches, install services, or pour concrete. We provide the spatial intelligence that lets those operators work safely and accurately.
  • Selling “locating” without quality-level designation. AS 5488 exists for a reason. We will not deliver an undifferentiated mark and call it located. Every service we designate carries a stated quality level.
  • Subcontracting field work to operators we haven’t trained or worked with directly. The spatial data leaving Orbital is captured by someone we trust to capture it correctly.

How we work

Three things are constant across every engagement, regardless of size or sector:

We scope before we quote

Most jobs benefit from a fifteen-minute conversation or a site visit before a price is committed. We’d rather quote accurately than discount mid-job because we missed something at the start. Send us the brief and we’ll come back with a scope and a fixed price.

We document everything

Every located service has a methodology stamp. Every QL-A point has a photo and a coordinate. Every CAD layer has a legend. Every report has a cover sheet. The data has to be defensible to your project auditor — that means it has to be defensible to us first.

We tell you what we found, including what we couldn’t find

Where a service doesn’t respond to either EMF or GPR, or where we can’t confirm depth without verification, we will say so and recommend QL-A. We will not invent a designation we can’t defend. Trust costs everything when it’s broken.

Tell us about your project. We’ll come back with a scope, a fixed-price quote, and the AS 5488 quality-level mix we’d recommend. Most projects in SEQ are scoped within 48 hours.