I feel your pain when it comes to getting backlash for your industry when you don’t feel that it is deserved. Hell, I was in the Navy Intelligence Community as we led up to these current wars. Bush used “Intelligence” as his reason for invading Iraq, and that was a lie. Trust me, I’ve heard the gamut of accusations there.

But I have also worked in the oil industry myself. I was a roustabout with RSI for two months as well as a security guard with Foremost Response for two months, working at Logan Wash. I’ve seen for myself how unsafe the people working out there are. I’m not just suggesting that they might be unsafe; I’ve actually been there and seen it firsthand.

When I was at RSI every pusher and truck crew that I was on made a daily habit of buying beer to drink ON THE DRIVE HOME. Since when is drinking and driving, particularly with all of that equipment on the road, a safe practice? Those guys weren’t even safe at work. They’d have me climbing up on top of water tanks that had no kind of non-skid up top, were covered in ice, and had nowhere to tether yourself off to because every fixture on the damn things were rusted away. Then they wanted us to start swinging a hammer while we were up there.

At Logan Wash, though I doubt they were drunk because they were still working, I saw a slew of bad drivers. In fact, an argument over unsafe driving practices was why I left that position in the first place. If they weren’t going to make my job safe for me, I wasn’t sticking around. I was nearly run off the COUNTY road, not even one of the dirt roads that go up through the switchbacks, by a guy who simply didn’t WANT to pay attention. I know because I chased him down and yelled in his face for nearly killing me. You know what he did? He told me I was going to get in trouble for talking to him that way because he was somebody special in one of the big companies or something.

No, when I say that the industry is unsafe, I mean very much that the industry is unsafe. The day after I wrote that piece about Tina I was nearly killed myself by a white oilfield truck pulling a trailer. I’m tired of it. I have to drive my children on that stretch of the highway, and I KNOW that it is unsafe for them.

I’m sorry if you’re worried that bad press will hurt your industry. We know in this valley all too well what that means for people. The oil shale boom and bust of the 1980’s nearly broke this valley’s back. My father owned three quarters of a million dollars worth of property here in the valley at that time. His plan was to hit a million and sell. A million bucks back then was a lot of money. Hell, it still is today. When the oil companies pulled out, he lost EVERYTHING.

Don’t cry to me then, Mr. Owen, when I write that oilfield workers are unsafe. They are. If your industry takes a hit as a result, then maybe you should consider refocusing your attention away from PRODUCTION and more towards SAFETY. And I’m not talking about safety of your workers at work, I mean the SAFETY OF EVERYONE ELSE IN THE VALLEY who now have to deal with your presence on our roads.

JMK

Thank you very much for your comment. That is a very chilling story, her near accident the night before. Our roads really and truly are getting more dangerous. I suppose this cannot be avoided as the population in our valley grows. I only wish people would be more careful when driving.

Thank you for your kind words.

JMK