Any ISOT members here?

Indirectly, I guess. Helicopter mechanic in Morgan City, La. for a couple years during that time. Also, Gambia, Qatar, Guyana supporting the Glomar Sirte. I'll bet you flew on the some of the ships I kept up. No t-shirt.

Garrett Fulton

Well I did work the patch but never got a tee shirt . Really though never got a bad comments from anyone other then survey crews . Sort of a built in rivalry there . People generally thought I was making a fortune , ha ha . When I started they were paying roughnecks $4.10 an hour . Decent but sure no great fortune . They do a ton better today . Ken Cutt

Gunner, raising his hand

Bendix Geophysical, Western Geophysical, Cactus Drilling, Poole Well Services, General Production Services, Lund Production.

"Considering the events of recent years, the world has a long way to go to regain its credibility and reputation with the US." unknown

I moved rigs as a summer job when I was going to uni. Moved a few Catus rigs in Saskatchewan and Alberta. Were you there?

Poole Well

"gfulton" wrote

Air Logistics or PHI? I always liked to see the 212s coming, because you were pretty sure to get a seat. And, like Radar on MASH, I could hear them before anyone else.

Steve

"Ken Cutt" wrote

I started off at $3.50 an hour. At that time, all you had to do to go offshore was have your bag packed. Today, with far less drilling, they can pick and choose their workers, and yes, they pay better now.

Still a TOUGH job. Especially up on the drill floor.

Steve

Did you know "Blondie" Bellard with Cactus?

Steve

PS: I worked for Norman Jet systems, Global, and Gulf Coast Divers as a diver, and for Reading and Bates as a crane operator.

Steve

Its been nearly 30 yrs since I rode a rotary table for Cactus. All I remember is the rigs were red, they were out of El Dorado Arkansas.

I do remember the blowouts, the rig that I was working derrick on that caught fire (blow out) while I was on the working board right after shift change (thank god for the geronimo line) and beating the mud guy to within an inch of his life for letting the water run in the pits while he was off chasing pussy during his shift...

That sucker burned for 3 weeks.

I worked for Cactus in Michigan in the gas fields in the early mid

70s. Gaylord fields. If I saw a picture of the guy..I might recognize him if he had ever been on my rig. Shrug.

Gunner

"Considering the events of recent years, the world has a long way to go to regain its credibility and reputation with the US." unknown

PHI and the 212's were what I worked on. Good strong machine and a pleasure to work on. No money in it, though.

Garrett

"SteveB" wrote in message news:J00ne.1449$4p.809@fed1read03...

Well, while we're on this subject, I'd like to be able to understand an operation performed on a drilling rig. In '75, I was based onshore in Guyana maintaing a Bell 212 that serviced the Glomar Sirte. The ship was offshore about 90 miles and had drilled down to 14,000 ft., if I remember this right. I was on the ship during some type of cementing operation that was about to take place where, as far as I could understand it, they were preparing to pump liquid cement down the hole under high pressure. It would be forced out through the bottom of the hole, migrate up between the earth and the drill pipe, harden and stabilize the pipe in the earth. I didn't know beans about drilling wells, it wasn't my field, but that was the best I could understand it. We had an old Irish drilling engineer named Jake Murphy, who was a close friend, and was doing the computation for this operation. The Shell Oil big boss was named Harry TenApple and was roundly disliked by everyone. He really was a thoroughbred asshole as even I had had a run in with him. Right before the cementing operation, Harry told Jake he was taking over supervision of the deal. Jake went up on the bridge, got a notepad, wrote up a statement absolving himself of any responsibility for anything that was to occur subsequent to Harry taking over. Took it to Harry, and made him sign it. Harry blustered and fumed, but signed it. About an hour later, I heard that Harry had messed up the amount of hardener that was supposed to go in the cement mixture and plugged up the 14,000 ft. hole at the 10,000 ft. level. They later moved the ship over a short distance and had to start a new hole. That was the way it was all explained to me. Harry got canned off the job and Jake flew back with us and got roaring drunk and celebrated in the hotel until the wee hours. He was the sweetheart of the rodeo for letting Harry hang himself, I guess. Didn't have to buy any drinks. Anyhow, have I got this cementing operation correct? Is that the way it works? You have to be dead on the money with the amount of hardener?

Garrett Fulton

Don't remember the name( It was thirty years ago) but we really didn't have that much to do with the rig crew usually. We'd just rock up at 5:00 AM and start tearing it out. With any luck, half the firts truck loads would be gone by noon. If it was a short move we'd be back in a couple of hours for another load. Didn't have much conversation time. The biggest customer was Precision Drilling who mostly has a bunch of crapped out 2 standers in those days. I believe that they have kicked on nicely now and a a real sharp operation. Moving rigs was hard work then and I suspect its still hard work. I can't see that there is any way to make a one inch winch line and tail chain any lighter or more flexible. Still, I enjoyed it at the time.

Tom Miller

>

I probably flew on ships you serviced. Thank you very much for the good work.

Steve

What - no Doodlebugs ? :-) Hope I spelled that right - the window decal is around here somewhere. Not a former member but knew them and some others that knew better.

Martin

Martin

calculating the hardener, so don't know about that. The drilling engineer used to come over and look at the calliper log to determine how much cement to run though. He'd just glance down the log and select a volume. Must have had divine assistance cause I sure couldn't have determined it from that. One point though, Its actually casing that they stabilize with cement. The drill pipe is out of the hole standing in the derrick. They case the hole with a larger diameter casing and cement it in. They then use a smaller bit to drill from the bottom of the casing to total depth. On some of the deep hole there would be three layers of casing between the formation & the drill pipe.

That was the time I spent working in 20 odd states and several countries "doodlebugging" on seismograph crews..Bendix and Western Geophysical. I ran a shot hole rig. Did some shooting, some observing, some jug hustling, even ran a tractor rig with a modified ditchwitch on the back to plant primacord underground in places we couldnt get a drill rig into. I liked the drilling down in the Brownsville area..we got to drill with air. Beat the hell out of standing over a mud pit in -50F weather outside of Sydney North Dakota and trying to keep from freezing to the ground between drill sections changes.

Gunner

"Considering the events of recent years, the world has a long way to go to regain its credibility and reputation with the US." unknown

Casing. Right. Should have known that. That's what it's called in my well out back too.

Garrett

Gunner,

Can you fill me in on how a hole is profiled using a radioactive source? My wife and her sister are convinced that their father died (eventually) of radiation poisoning caused by an accident at a well. The story, as I heard it, was that he (working for Wellex/Halliburton in the 50's) was on a crew shooting a well. The drill hit a gas pocket and drill, pipe, and radioactive source were shot into the air. The container holding the radioactive source ruptured mid-air and covered the crew in a white powder. The crews' exposure badges were lost by Wellex. The guys on the crew were transferred to different areas of the country, and all died young from old age (the girls' father died at 47 fighting kidney, liver, and heart failure).

I there any possibility that this could have happened? How hot is the radiation source?

Or have the girls whipped up a conspiracy theory?

Kevin Gallimore

I'm not Gunner, but I hung around the industry a little bit.

I always thought that radioactive profiling was done with a wireline after the drill string was pulled. So it seems unlikely that the tool could have opened a gas pocket.

It also seems unlikely that there would be enough source material to "cover the crew with white powder" and unlikely that it would break open.