Weather improvements

The weather seems to be breaking here. It was quite warm this afternoon and as you can see this evening it is 17C. Crazy hot for this area. Actually word on the street is that in the summer it gets quite hot and humid here. Hopefully I will find out.

Bla

Well I made it out again today for a short hike. I went up a private road that belongs to Syncrude (one of the oilsands corporations). It was kind of peaceful, but kind of sad. When I looked back on my tracks in the snow I realized that it was kind of symbolic. One set of tracks, where there used to be six. The more time that passes the more I realize that sometimes you live life according to the choices of others, not of your own.

I was talking to my general foreman and apparently when this job starts to wind down there will be the option to transfer to another job closer to Edmonton. It is part of two projects being done by Shell that combined have a value of somewhere between $25-$30 billion. Yes billion. Anyway that project is still good for years to come. So I can imagine that my life in Alberta has just started. Although it is really not much of a life. I am starting to think that the best thing I could do is buy a house out here and call it a day. This may be difficult to deal with for me and the children, but unfortunately I have to worry about myself at some point. No one else is going to do it for me.

I did end up going for a hike yesterday. It wasn't much of a hike it was more like a walk as I had to walk on the side of the road. There was too much snow to go out on trails. Either way I went about 10km. The picture is where I turned around and went back. It was a pretty good day. I think I may head out again today. Maybe I can see something interesting. Or just fill the giant void a bit.

Off weekend

This weekend is my off weekend. I guess I could use some rest. I don't think I will go into town this time. I don't have any money to spend, and there is nothing that I realistically need to spend money on. Plus Fort McMurray sucks. So I think I will get out and about for a hike, it is supposed to warm up to a scorching 10 C today. Hopefully I can get out and get some pictures. Otherwise I will just hang out and drink coffee until my brain starts to vibrate!

They sent us back to camp today after we took the death defying bus trip in to the job. They decided it would be safer for us to take two death defying trips in one morning. Actually most of the upper management could not make it in from Fort McMurray. The highway was really bad. It has been snowing for about three days now. Hopefully it will have stopped by tomorrow. While we were waiting for our bus to show up we saw one of the big dump trucks go by our job with its box up. After it went through the intersection it hit the highline (a pipeline above the roadway). I think the driver was hurt, as you could see him get thrown out of his seat like a ragdoll. Either way the truck is broken, there is damage to the highline and I am pretty sure the driver will get fired.

So the weather has taken a bit of a turn for the worse here in the great white north. We recorded temperatures on the jobsite today of -30 C. They have canceled all flights because of the whiteout conditions. Environment Canada has issued a winter storm warning for the area. I am pasting in two pictures of the contrast between last Sunday and this Sunday. There is a noticeable difference. Locals are saying that we are going to get 3 feet of snow over the next couple days. Yay!

-20 Spring is officially here!

As everyone back home enjoys a warm spring with temperatures of 24C, spring here in northern Alberta seems to mean snow and temperatures of -20. It was quite a shock after last weekend was 15C to see snow again and have the thermometer dip that much. I guess this is the life of an Albertan!

mmmm...........chicken!

Someone recently asked me what the food was like here. Luckily for the time being I am in one of the better camps. So today for lunch I had a chicken stir fry, breaded chicken breast stuffed with broccoli and cheese, plus breaded pork chunks with rice and green beans. Of course I also had a pastry and oreo cookies. For dinner we had a choice of quarter chicken, fettuccine Alfredo, meatloaf, a variety of potatoes and vegetables, rice, and a fresh cream vegetable and cheese soup. Of course there are fresh rolls, and ice cream, plus the dessert fridge. Every Tuesday is New York Steak and shrimp night. So I guess in the end you could say that I am eating just fine. I definitely will not starve to death here.

Camp

I just thought that I would put up a few pictures of the camp that I am staying in. I cannot remember how many people this camp holds but someone once told me that it was 4000. I don't think it is quite that, but it sure would be 2000 or more.

Athabasca River

I had the weekend off and since I went into Fort McDirty on Saturday, I decided to go for a walk yesterday. I figured since the camp is right beside the Athabasca river (hence the name Athabasca Lodge) I would go for a short hike down by the river. I am posting a few pics. I cannot wait for the river to shed itself of all the ice. It looks like a great spot for canoing. And yes the picture with the giant pipe going up under the bridge is an oil pipeline. It goes from the mine to the refinery (Syncrude). Some things around here are a little strange.

Fort McMurray, what charm

This weekend is my off weekend, so I went into Fort McMurray on the recreation bus that the company provides us. What an eye opener. It has to be the dirtiest town I have ever seen! I am posting some photos of the things that I saw there and on my way there. Of course what was the first thing that I saw on the sidewalk when I got off the bus, a used syringe of course.

One of the good experiences I had in town was at Tim Horton's. I waited literally 1/2 and hour in line for the 7 people behind the counter to serve the 9 people in front of me. To top it off every customer only got coffee, nothing special, so sandwiches or anything complicated.

Another point of interest was the amount of liquor stores for such a small town. I saw at least five. There is such a boom on liquor in that town that even the Great Canadian Superstore got in on the action with 'The Great Canadian Liquor Store'. Charming!

And I almost forgot. I bought a Fort McMurray newspaper today because of the article on the from page. I am providing a link to it. But just in case the link is broken the jist of the story is that there is an old truck camper abandoned in a field with a big spray painted sign on it that says, "For Rent $3500 a month, big back yard, water front views, utilities included and close to golfing". Of course this is not far from the truth. You can rent a bedroom in Fort McMurray for $1000 a month. It makes Toronto look like a pittance.

Idiot

So Thursday night started out ok. I went to bed but then had to get up to get a neocitran for my cold. Then I heard the arguing. Some dumb ass brought a girl to his room and they were drunk and fighting. After a bit they ended up in the hall, so I had to go out. When I went out she was curled up on the floor and he was trying to drag her by the arm. I called security. They she ran back in his room and locked the door. She then proceeded to start throwing all of his stuff at the walls and door. The last was his laptop with her screaming, "that was your fucking laptop asshole". What a treat. Anyway, the police came and he got dragged away and charged with assault. His room was automatically canceled. So that means his job steward would have had to come and pack his belongings. Then to top it all off PCL will be sending him home. Well worth it for a few drinks wouldn't you say?

Ipods for everyone!

Word on the site is that PCL is going to be giving all of the employees on site an ipod. This is supposed to happen as a thank you for the 6,000,000 man hours Lost Time Injury Free. I could imagine that they will be the most basic model as they would be handing out over 1000. It definitely won't be cheap, that is for sure. Of course I am hoping the rumor is true and that they will be giving out the premium model. But I am sure that this is just wishful thinking.

10,000,000 man hours

So PCL had a BBQ lunch for us today. Apparently on their portion of this site they had gone 'Lost Time Injury Free' for over 6,000,000 man hours. I was amazed that they could get over 1200 people served food in under 45 minutes. The whole jobsite has gone over 10,000,000 man hours LTI free. It freaks me out how many man hours have been put into this project. But I guess if you are going to spend $10,000,000,000 building something it is going to take alot of hours to do it. I have taken some more pictures. I am posting one of the PCL crew leaving through 'brass alley' at the end of the shift. At the point that I took the picture I am about halfway in the lineup. The other pictures are of the units that PCL is building, which would be combined to be called the 'Primary Upgrade' or PUG site. The first picture with the crane in it is of the 'coker'. This structure is over 400' high. Just to be able to scale its size you can see on the left partway up the structure on the concrete columns two 60' lunch trailers. That should give you an idea of the size of all of this.

You will also notice a picture of my foot. I am standing on a scaffold up about 250' on the coker. This is the kind of thing I do for money. And yes I am tied off with fall protection and in no real danger. Of course If I did fall they would have to get the high angle rescue team to get me down.

Update

So I am pretty well settled in. Now I am getting used to things a little. I have taken a few pictures of the things around. I sure you can see them here. I recently found out that as far as we know this is the largest jobsite on the planet at this time. There are currently over 11,000 people working on this site. And this is only the first phase of three. Also there are a few other jobs starting up that are of the same scale and maybe even a little bigger. Suncor, another refinery close by has just constructed an airport on site as well. They too are getting ready to start a major expansion. There is a good chance that I will be working here for quite some time. Anyway I will post some of my pictures.
This picture is of one of the doors going out of the camp that I am in. Camp Athabaska. And it is named that because it is right beside the Athabaska river. And yes they are talking about grizzly bears!

Day 3

I got in Sunday night. It would have been about 11:30 Ontario time. Not bad since I had only been up since 4:00 am that day. It took me until about 1:30am to get sorted out. So I have been pretty tired. This place is by far the absolute biggest jobsite I could imagine. In the morning there are literally hundreds of buses taking the guys on site. Hopefully I can get some pictures.

Apparently there are 5 grizzly bears that hang around our camp. With any luck I can get some pictures of them as well. I am not feeling like explaining a whole lot right now, but there is lots to tell. This is quite an experience. I will get to more of it later.