RIG LIFE

So I'm on a rig north of Meeker CO, I just got up early(up at 12:30 pm is early- I work from 4pm to 4am), and I am currently doing laundry. That sounds like a P-Day. The rig is called Grey Wolf 520 and we are drilling for natural gas other then my own. So the first big mistake I made was on last saturday. My job is two fold. Monitor gas and every 30 feet get a sample of the mud(then clean the mud; then identify the tiny rock fragments that are left over from the mud).


I check gas and wash mud. Last Saturday the gas chromatagraph just froze up at a certain amount and stayed there so I tryed to fix it. What I ended up doing was accidentally clearing the presets that allowed the machine to know which gas was which, I.E. butane, ethane, propane, methane, and CO2. I went to my lead who was sleeping and knocked on the door 3 times and he was fast asleep. I didn't want to make him mad so I went back and restarted the machine and still couldn't fix it. During this time we are losing data. I ran back and tried to wake him up by knocking and still no effect on his slumber. Finally 2 hours later when his shift starts he comes in and I am till franticly trying to fix the machine. I could tell he was upset. He told me that this was one of the situations were you your lead up or loose your job.


He was able to recalibrate the machine another hour later. So I lost 3.5 hours of data or about 100 feet. Luckily they did no flares(they pump the excess "anes" to a pit and light it on fire) and no one died of CO2 poisoning.


Three days later I'm talking with the company man and he asks who didn't know the bathroom wasn't hooked up in the trailer. That was me, good thing I only number 2'ed once. You see we have a trailer that holds all of our equipment and office. We sleep in a camp that is made up of four single wides all connected together. It has a cafeteria, bathrooms, showers, a day room with satellite tv, and laundry facilities. The work/office has a bunk bed in it and a bathroom with a shower. No one said anything about it and I ran a practice flush to see if it worked. Lo and behold it flushed, obviously it works. So I've been using the bathroom for 3 days and my stuff has just been landing in the dirt next to the trailer. Luck for me last night had 3 big heavy rain showers and all the evidence of my indiscresions had been washed away.


So becuase we have this special gas chromatagraph we have to stay on site after the drilling, so my two fold job is now one fold, stare at a computer monitor watching the gas readings. We have to wait for them to log the well, wipe the well and case the well. The company Schlumburger(pronounced schlum - bur - jay, not schlum - burger) came to log the well. They attach a string of sensors to the drill pipe and run it back down the hole to test for abunch of things such as; resistivity and radioactivity, among others I don't understand. They started their tests this morning at 4 am, then their pump broke, now they are waiting on a replacement from Vernal, Ut. This pushes back the hole wiping(that was a great pun I had to add it) which is just them sending the pipe all the way back down the hole and circulating the mud to condition and clean the hole, which in turn pushes back casing the hole(which is where they put cement and a heavy permenant pipe into the hole to channel the gas to the surface). This job was supposed to finish last Wensday but may go till Sunday at the best of circumstances.


So thats life at the rig. Last note the cafateria ladies are so nice and always make sure I get extra prime rib and mashed potatoes. Thats just my way of saying that the food is great here.



I tryed to find a picture of the Lunch Lady Land Farley so this is the next best thing.

This week was pretty fun. I got put in charge of a Super Saturday craft activity. I had fun preping for it. I made some hooded towels and had fun making up some cute designs. My favorites are this king, the duck (the bill opens up) the lady bug, and the Superman of course!

I got REALLY hot this week and couldn't stand my long hair so I chopped it off! It is actually the first time in a long time I am excited about a haircut. The layers in the back go all the way up to the crown of my head. I love it.
Jensen has been getting good at hugs.

Another Week In Camp

Another 5 days in camp, well its been more like 7. We started this week of field camp on the 25th of June and finished on the 29th but because of the 4th of July we only did the next week for 2 days, so a total of 7 days. This picture is a view of some of the more green parts of my particular area. Have I mentioned that its dry around here?

TREE KILLING DRY!

On one particular day my classmate and I decided to hike about 7 miles, what a great decision. We got a ride from Bro. Little, you remember him he had a flat tire, up an old mining road. Partway up the road smoke began to fill the car. We stopped and dropped off two other students for their "date"(more on that subject available upon request) and investigated the problem. The hood was popped and the engine was inspect to find nothing wrong there. Smoke was beginning to accumulate in the back seat now that the car was stopped. The professor and I flipped up the back seat to find that it was on FIRE! The body plating above the exhaust had weathered away and the interior was now finally exposed to the full burning fury of the muffler. So we did what any self respecting geologist would do, we put a rock under the seat and drove on.

Further along the same "trail"(there are no trails only old game paths) my classmate and I hiked we stopped at a ridge to take pictures. Behind me is Copper Mountain and apparently the bane of the other students, at least that's what they always tell me.

"Your area is too easy, you don't have to climb Copper Mountain."

Well the picture describes the how wrong they are(Note that I am 1800 feet below Copper Mountain in this picture the angle was just too good to pass up).

This is a photograph of some folded rock in the area. Now its time for a geologic lesson. Sediments are originally deposited horizontally, but over time certain pressures can cause them to fold or buckle. This particular unit is 30 feet tall and 50-75 feet wide.

This picture is of a chert bed in the Snakey Limestone. Really its the last good photo of my rock hammer. Remember that long hike? I left the hammer up there some where. Tears are wetting my keyboard as I think of that hammer. Its all about the memories.

This photo is in Goddard Canyon and was the midpoint of our 7 mile hike. It is a slot canyon where at some points it is less then 20 feet wide. The scary part was that its filled with a ton of caves that reminded me of the movie "Congo". I figured that if albino killer guerrillas showed up I sign 'Ugly Guerrillas', push my classmate down and run.