The new job

[Matt]

Been out here in the oil fields a little over 3 weeks now, and loving the hell out of it. Naturally I haven't been on much over that time span, other than to run the sims, as I am still getting used to things out here. The first week was training, the second week was getting a feel for things on my own, and by this past week I was rolling along pretty well.

The hours are long, but there is actually a lot of down time. Which is, for the most part, used for sleep. Because you never know when exactly you are going to work, so when you can, you sleep. Often times I will get to a well with a load, and then sit for anywhere from a couple hours to as long as 15 hours waiting to unload. The nice part is, they pay me for sitting. Or more accurately, for sleeping.

It's an around the clock job. You might come off a well at 1 am, find a place to sleep, then get called at 4 am to go get another load. Other times you will get lucky and get to sleep without being bothered, you just never know. Which puts a premium on getting sleep at every available opportunity. Especially if you are on a well and it will be awhile before you get a chance to unload, that way you can be ready to run for another load as soon as you unload.

It's South Texas, so it's hot, even in October. And often humid. Showers are another thing that are at a premium. I can't get near enough of them, sometimes it's two or three days between, just because of the way we have to run. Which makes baby wipes, bottled water, and gold bond powder absolute necessities if you don't want to smell like a dead carp.


Its a dirty job, no doubt about it, but not hard, other than the inconvenience of the sleep and showers. About 70% of the loads are within a 60 mile radius, the other 30% you might go as far away as 150 miles to pick up. Lot of back road driving, not the interstate highway driving I am so used to. And a LOT of dirt road driving. One well on Friday, it was 25 miles down the dirt road, and it's so damned bumpy and dusty you can't do more than about 15 miles an hour, and often less than that. Took me two hours each way just on the dirt portion of the road on that trip. The other hard part on the dirt roads is not getting lost. A lot of the ranches these wells are on are huge, with multiple well sites, with multiple dirt roads going off in different directions. The directions going in usually work well enough, but coming back out, when your 15 or 20 miles in down multiple turns, in the dark at 3am, well that can get interesting. Been more than once I have had to stop, look over the intersection of the dirt road, in the dark, and try to work my directions backwards to make sure I make the correct turn.

If it rains, the roads become muddy, and the wells themselves can become mud pits. One well I was at, I was slogging through ankle deep mud the entire time I was there. I have to unload the sand, which is done by pumping it out through hoses into whichever containers it needs to go in. So I get out, hook up hoses, start the blower, then have to watch my pressure gauges and make sure the hoses don't clog. Typically this about an hour process, and when it's ankle deep mud, you get dirty. Really dirty. Often, it's just dry and dusty, but in either case, you can't help but end up with dirt inside the truck. If it's just dust, that's not too bad. When it's mud, it's worse. It's impossible to keep the inside of the truck clean, you just fight the battle and try to keep the dirt manageable.

The pay is possibly even better than I was led to believe, as I grossed 2700 last week. How can you not love a job that pays like that? I plan to enjoy it while it lasts, and bank as much as I can, because if there is one thing I know about oil in this country, it is that it is always a boom or bust situation. Back in the heart of the recession, WTI traded about 35 a barrel, and no one was drilling at those prices. Drillers need the price of oil to stay above a certain level for drilling to be cost effective. With the next price plunge this will all likely dry up again. It costs about 2 mil to drill a vertical well, and 8 mil to drill a horizontal well (fracking), and all these wells are of the 8 mil variety so these drillers need a reasonable return on the investment.

Typically, we work 3-4 weeks out in the field, then go home for 5-6 days off. This will allow me scenario's where I make sure to take my home time when PEBA has live events, like the winter meetings and especially the draft.

For now, I am going to leave our Sat/Tues sim schedule in place, and will run our sims at the first available time after the sim deadline. As I get to know the job and how things work out here a little better, I may adjust the times if I can figure a reasonable way to make things more dependable and timely.

I'll also probably seek a little help with a few tasks, just to make it easier to keep this ship running. I'll talk to the Board soon about what I need help with and how we can keep things functioning as smooth as possible. But in no case will PEBA be going away, no matter what.

[John]

Congratulations on the new job, Matt! Has to be nice to finally be out of the truck. Glad to hear that this new endeavor is working so well for you. Let us know how it develops.

[Simon]

Congratz Matt, it was nice reading too

[Lions]

Thanks for the update, Matt! Sounds like a good gig for you and the descriptions are fascinating. Hope you've got time to connect with family and friends, too.

[richard_v]

Interesting that it's fracking as that's became a rather hot topic over these shores recently, glad it's going well

[Zephyrs]

Thanks for the update Matt. I work a fairly unusual job, therefore I am fascinated by on the job tails. Keep them coming.

[Cole]

Interesting that it's fracking as that's became a rather hot topic over these shores recently, glad it's going well

Big issue over here too.. We had tons of protests last summer/fall over this, with everything coming to a boiling point when police went to enforce a court-ordered injunction and it turned real ugly, 40 arrests, cop cars lit on fire, Molotov cocktails being thrown, police in riot gear... was definitely an interesting time.

I'd be curious if there's any sort of protest/resistance to this type of work out where you are Matt?

And, congrats on the job, glad it's going well.

[Leones]

Fascinating reading Matt. Gotta admire a guy in this day and age who still gets the dirty work done. Tip of the hat! Glad it's working well and you're getting into the rhythm of it all. Stay safe.

[Arroyos]

I was exhausted just reading about your job, Matt. All those dirt roads, long hours, dust ... somedays I forget what a cushy job I have. Hope you make barrels and barrels of money, man, and get out before the work kills you or the next oil bust.

[Matt]

Yeah, fracking seems to be hot button issue. I think more of the protesting and lawsuits in this country have been centered around WV, Pennsylvania, and Ohio, which is the Utica shale play and that is mostly natural gas. They are also more densely populated than say South Texas or North Dakota. I have yet to see any protests down here, and doubt you ever will.

Down here in the Eagleford and in the Bakken up in North Dakota, the wells are going almost strictly for oil. Now, when you drill an oil well, you are going to hit natural gas anyways. It's all in the same places. But here in the Eagleford, they don't even bother capturing the natural gas. They just flare it off. In other words, they burn it straight into the atmosphere. At hundreds of wells, around the clock.

This seems rather wasteful, and it is. But it is not cost effective to trap all the natural gas at the moment, as we already have an over supply, weak prices, and not enough storage capacity for it. There is work being done to begin exporting LNG, but most export terminals won't come online for two more years (2016) or later. So if you are someone who worries about the environment and climate change, this can be a little troubling. I can't say that aspect hasn't bothered me. But what am I going to do about it? Walk away from a great job because I think a trillion dollar industry is being wasteful and possibly damaging the environment? Hell, they are still going to be doing whether I'm a part of it or not. I'm just being pragmatic and making a living.

The other issue that comes up with fracking is the chemicals being used, and whether they will affect our ground water supplies. I know people have their concerns, but I have heard both sides of the argument and I don't know. It seems as deep as the wells are drilled that the chemicals should not affect water supplies, but then again, who knows. We do know a lot of the chemicals used in fracking are carcinogens. But until someone shows me testing of groundwater, (and almost all wells that supply water to a municipality are tested regularly), that shows those carcinogens getting into the water supply, I have to believe it's safe.

My daughter thinks fracking is evil, and offers up all this anecdotal "evidence" about the dangers of fracking. But anecdotal evidence is not hard fact, and hardly evidence at all. Show me hard data and I'll be glad to change my opinion.

[Alleghenies]

My daughter thinks fracking is evil, and offers up all this anecdotal "evidence" about the dangers of fracking. But anecdotal evidence is not hard fact, and hardly evidence at all. Show me hard data and I'll be glad to change my opinion.

...the dangers of fracking....

I think that is part of the issue. There isn't hard evidence, just dangers. There are a lot of things out there that are dangerous or risky but also a necessity. A lot of things like fracking fall under the area that not a lot of people know what it is or what they are actually protesting. They just heard it is bad and believe it is bad without looking into it(not saying your daughter is one of those). Nuclear power, I place in the same category. In a perfect world, sure, we wouldn't need to frack or even use oil, but that isn't the world we live in. There are a lot of things out there more dangerous than fracking. Heck wind turbines are extremely dangerous to birds and kill hundreds and hundreds each year, introducing a new 'predator' into the ecosystem, but I don't hear environmentalists complaining about the big bad bird killers. Part of me just thinks some people like to protest. Others just jump on the protesting bandwagon.

On a side note about protesting, I had a funny experience when I was in the Navy at their nuclear training facility in Saratoga Springs, NY. While I was there, the townsfolk organized a protest against nuclear power and drove to the "closest" reactor in Albany, 40 miles to the south when the whole time there were two live nuclear reactors in their back yard with young 19 year old kids that were doing hands on training and operating a real reactor to the limits during drills in preparation to go to a real ship.

Anyway, I know we are kinda bordering on politics here and I think we are supposed to avoid stuff like this on the forums. Congrats on the job!

[Matt]

Like you said Dan, there are dangers in everything. Funniest one is solar power, where the arrays in the SW are so large that they are literally burning birds in flight. The folks who work the solar farms even have a name for them, streamers, because they burst into flame and crash to the ground.

As I said, I am pragmatic. It is a fossil fuel world. At some point we need to move away from fossil fuels, bit indication is it won't be soon. We can either rely on the Saudis and pay $4 a gallon or more, or we can drill our own and push the prices back towards $2. I am liking the latter option.

Keep in mind, this energy boom is what is fueling an otherwise stagnant economy. It has also allowed us to bring some manufacturing jobs back to the US as cheaper energy costs have negated a lot of the benefits of manufacturing overseas. It's definitely a side of the equation some who are protesting fail to see.
But I don't want to be political about it either. I try to look at the bigger picture and fully understand that there are people who take a negative view of fracking. Me, I'm just the guy who drives the truck and delivers the sand, and have a lot of fun doing so.

[Lions]

and have a lot of fun doing so.

This is what I like best about your stories. You're having a grand time making a living. A lot of people hate their jobs and would love to do something else.

[Matt]

Grid coordinates of the well i am at this morning. 28.334721 -99.661943. You can put that in google maps and see the satellite view. Lots of wells in this area.

[Bill]

I was wondering...Are the oil prices having any affect on your situation?