[OT]Summer Job: Offshore Oil Rig?

[jdavis]

You know, I'm reading this (and thank you for the links, I find it quite informative). Those rates sound -I think- similar to getting a nasty reaction to the Smallpox vaccine. It's a bit hard to quantify, to me at least, the dangers. Sure, you're human, but what's 140/100,000? 14/10,000. 1.4 deaths out of every thousand people.

And for some odd, odd reason, I feel compelled to go on a fishing boat now ...

So rarely does my caree cross over into the realm of EN world (Safety not fishing).

Think about it this way, next time your in Wal Mart checking out try to imagine the ratio of on the job deaths to workers who check people out on cash registers. How many of those little old ladies will suffer a horrible painful on the job accident and will die in agony, well if the line is really long you will figure not enough. 1.4 to 1000 odds seems pretty good until your the guy crushed to death or drowning in artic water. This year 20 to 30 people will die so that you can go to Lobsterfest at the local Red Lobster. There are no telling how many people are seriously injured just so you can have crab legs added to your meal, the catch of the day actually has a mortality rate involved with catching it. Most people don't figure they might die doing their job, commercial fishermen know that every year several people will.

 

[jdavis]

Major oil industry accidents
March 20, 2001
Web posted at: 12:20 PM EST (1720 GMT)
http://www.cnn.com/2001/WORLD/americas/03/20/oil.accidents/index.html


A chronology of some of the major oil industry accidents in the last 20 years:

March 1980: Alexander Keilland oil rig in Ekofisk field of North Sea broke up with fatigue fracture and capsized, killing 123 people.

October 1981: United States oil drilling ship sank in South China Sea, killing 81 people. September 1982: U.S. oil rig Ocean Ranger keeled over in the North Atlantic, killing 84 people.

February 1984: One man was killed and two injured in an oil rig explosion off Texas in the Gulf of Mexico.

August 1984: Thirty-six workers drowned and 17 were injured in an explosion and fire on a Petrobras oil-drilling platform in the Campos Basin off Brazil.

January 1985: Two men were killed and two injured in a pump room explosion on Glomar Arctic II rig in the North Sea.

July 1988: In the world's worst oil rig disaster, 167 people were killed when Occidental Petroleum's Piper Alpha oil rig in the North Sea exploded after a gas leak.

September 1988: Four workers were killed when an oil rig owned by Total Petroleum Co. of France exploded and sank off the southeastern coast of Borneo.

September 1988: One person was killed and 66 people rescued uninjured after American-owned Ocean Odyssey drilling rig burst into flames in the North Sea.

May 1989: Three people were injured in an explosion and fire on an offshore oil platform owned by Union Oil Co. of California. The rig was operating on the Cook Inlet, southwest of Anchorage, Alaska.

November 1989: An explosion on a Penrod Drilling Co. oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico injured 12 workers, one seriously.

August 1991: Three people were injured in an explosion on Fulmar Alpha platform in the North Sea, owned by Shell.

December 1991: One crew member died after a Petrobras tanker explosion off the Sao Paulo, Brazil state coast.

March 1992: A French-built Super Puma helicopter, carrying 15 workers and two crewmen, plunged into the North Sea seconds after taking off from Cormorant Alpha platform to make a short hop to an accommodation vessel. Eleven men died.

January 1995: Thirteen people were killed in an explosion on a Mobil oil rig off the coast of Nigeria. Many were injured.

November 1995: One person died and five were wounded in a Petrobras pipeline fire in Sao Paulo.

January 1996: Three people were killed and two injured in an explosion on a rig in the Morgan oil field in the Gulf of Suez.

July 1998: Two men died in an explosion on the Glomar Arctic IV rig.

December 1998: One person died after plunging from the mobile drilling rig Petrolia, northeast of Aberdeen, Scotland.

December 1998: A fire at Petrobras's Gabriel Passos Refinery in Minas Gerais killed three workers.

January 2001: Two workers died from a fire on a Petrobras offshore natural gas platform in Campos Basin.

March 2001: Ten people were killed after explosions rocked the world's biggest offshore oil platform belonging to Brazil's state oil firm Petrobras.

 

[howandwhy99]

The semi-submersible platform "Claymore" in the North Sea:
http://www.cleddau.com/

 

[bolen]

My best friend worked in alaska durring the summers. If you can get a job fishing it is very good money (but dangerous and hard work). If you cant get on a boat you work in the cannary, I heard this really sucks. You get OK pay but you smell dead fish all day and night. I kind of gather it really helps to get an in on a boat if you want to fish.

Afraid I know next to nothing about oil rigs.

 

[frankthedm]

The semi-submersible platform "Claymore" in the North Sea:
http://www.cleddau.com/

semi-submersible

 

[MavrickWeirdo]

Okay, I'm looking for a good summer job. And by good, I mean lots of money. From what I've heard, this industry can be an excellent place to make a good amount of cash.

In fact, when I'm done my degree next year, I'd even consider working in this capacity for several years to make some good money to start a life with.

I'm smart, strong and a dedicated worker; so does anyone have any experience and insight into this sector, and any advice on how to succeed at obtaining a job and advancing your career, specifically working on offshore oil platforms?

Look up "This American Life" (a national public raido show). In one episode a guy talks about his experience as a dishwasher on an offshore oil rig.

 

[diver dave]

Working in Gulf of Mexico

I spent 20 years in the oilfield, as a diver. To me it was one of the best jobs out there. It only took me 1-year of schooling and half a lifetime to learn the job. As for the rest of the oilfield crew, it is hard work. You have tons of steel around you being moved all over the rig in which there is no room to move. You have constant noise, twelve hour shifts, and unless your a diver, low pay. If you added up what you make in two weeks offshore then subtracted what you didn't make the two weeks you were off you would take a land based job and not worry about being killed through some mistake. Now a diver on the other hand makes good money, but not hourly, but by the depths he works at. The average pay for a first class diver is $15.00 per hour, and that rate hasn't moved in the twenty years I've been in the field. As a laboror you can expect to make maybe $8.00 to $12.00 per hour. But is thats what you want to do with your degree. Good luck!

 

[Dave Turner]

Nevermind the oil rig. If you have any military experience, you can get a great summer job working "security" in Iraq.

 

[Patryn of Elvenshae]

?

 

[frankthedm]

Points bony claw Hsssssss... That is no necromancer! 'Tis a vile spambot!

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