unions offshore. Only company policy and a supervisor’s goodwill stand between men and exhaustion. If the company wants drillers to work sixteen hours straight, they can make them.
The normal compensation for the grueling schedule is the promise of three weeks off at the end of every three-week hitch for supervisors and technicians (or two weeks on, two weeks off for lower positions). And the money: Drilling hands, kids right out of high school, can make $40,000 to $50,000 a year. As third mate,Dave was bringing home close to $100,000 a year. The captain earned up to $200,000 and the OIM even more.
The money was good enough to make rig life bearable to most, and even enjoyable to many. Weeks on the rig were a time to be away from the complications of shore life. They were with friends, doing challenging work that brought tangible results. They worked hard, and when the long shifts were over, they ate dinner, read a book, watched a movie, or went to bed. Every evening, you could find a handful of romantics at the deck rail, watching the sun set. For every nature lover, however, there were half a dozen others glued to video consoles, playing Street Fighter. Some of the younger hands had the energy to work out in the small “gym,” which was just a room with a weight set, two treadmills, and a StairMaster. Others played poker, friendly games mostly, though some might leave the table a few hundred bucks poorer or richer.
Others, like Dave, spent most of their nonworking, still-conscious time on laptops, chatting with wives or girlfriends, working toward online degrees, starting personal websites.
Or watching television. The rigs had satellite TV capable of receiving twenty channels at a time—making inevitable the ongoing battles over which twenty. The perennial winners: Fox News (always), the Weather Channel, Country Music Television, the Rodeo Channel, Outdoor Life, and anything involving antlers and largemouth bass. When the big bosses came in from town, CNBC was switched on. Most rigs used to have adult channels, but as more women began to arrive, the racier TV fare was purged. Instead, contraband porn DVDs were traded around the rig like baseball cards.
The ten-by-twelve-foot crew cabins, most of which had a DVD player and a seventeen-inch TV, were identical. Most were shared by two crew members who worked opposite hours—meaning theywere almost never in the room at the same time. Some low-level crew were bunked four to a room. Only the captain and the OIM had a room to themselves.
Legend has it that the captain of Transocean’s rig Discoverer Deep Seas, to better demonstrate his elevated status, requisitioned a monster forty-two-inch flat-screen TV that barely fit in his tiny room. Word of the purchase order, approved by the rig manager onshore, leaked out. As soon as the hitch was up, some crew members visited a local florist to order the biggest, gaudiest flower display in the shop, complete with a teddy bear centerpiece and balloons. They sent it to the rig manager with a note that said, “Thank you for the flat-screen TV!”
The TV order was promptly canceled.
Ribbing and one-upmanship were common elements of rig life, but outright fights were rare. The lack of booze and drugs, and the fear of doing anything to jeopardize the almighty rig pass, tended to keep things civil.
Rig populations are still overwhelmingly white and male. Transocean and other companies have made some advance in diversity in recent years, but the largest incidence of women and minorities still occur in the catering staff. Given the relatively low salaries and long hours, many of the catering positions are filled by people who come from impoverished backgrounds and have few other options. On some rigs, the caterers, hired and managed by a subcontractor, remain permanently on the edges of rig life, never really thought of as part of the crew. But some crews make a point to include the cooks and waiters and janitors, inviting them to
The normal compensation for the grueling schedule is the promise of three weeks off at the end of every three-week hitch for supervisors and technicians (or two weeks on, two weeks off for lower positions). And the money: Drilling hands, kids right out of high school, can make $40,000 to $50,000 a year. As third mate,Dave was bringing home close to $100,000 a year. The captain earned up to $200,000 and the OIM even more.
The money was good enough to make rig life bearable to most, and even enjoyable to many. Weeks on the rig were a time to be away from the complications of shore life. They were with friends, doing challenging work that brought tangible results. They worked hard, and when the long shifts were over, they ate dinner, read a book, watched a movie, or went to bed. Every evening, you could find a handful of romantics at the deck rail, watching the sun set. For every nature lover, however, there were half a dozen others glued to video consoles, playing Street Fighter. Some of the younger hands had the energy to work out in the small “gym,” which was just a room with a weight set, two treadmills, and a StairMaster. Others played poker, friendly games mostly, though some might leave the table a few hundred bucks poorer or richer.
Others, like Dave, spent most of their nonworking, still-conscious time on laptops, chatting with wives or girlfriends, working toward online degrees, starting personal websites.
Or watching television. The rigs had satellite TV capable of receiving twenty channels at a time—making inevitable the ongoing battles over which twenty. The perennial winners: Fox News (always), the Weather Channel, Country Music Television, the Rodeo Channel, Outdoor Life, and anything involving antlers and largemouth bass. When the big bosses came in from town, CNBC was switched on. Most rigs used to have adult channels, but as more women began to arrive, the racier TV fare was purged. Instead, contraband porn DVDs were traded around the rig like baseball cards.
The ten-by-twelve-foot crew cabins, most of which had a DVD player and a seventeen-inch TV, were identical. Most were shared by two crew members who worked opposite hours—meaning theywere almost never in the room at the same time. Some low-level crew were bunked four to a room. Only the captain and the OIM had a room to themselves.
Legend has it that the captain of Transocean’s rig Discoverer Deep Seas, to better demonstrate his elevated status, requisitioned a monster forty-two-inch flat-screen TV that barely fit in his tiny room. Word of the purchase order, approved by the rig manager onshore, leaked out. As soon as the hitch was up, some crew members visited a local florist to order the biggest, gaudiest flower display in the shop, complete with a teddy bear centerpiece and balloons. They sent it to the rig manager with a note that said, “Thank you for the flat-screen TV!”
The TV order was promptly canceled.
Ribbing and one-upmanship were common elements of rig life, but outright fights were rare. The lack of booze and drugs, and the fear of doing anything to jeopardize the almighty rig pass, tended to keep things civil.
Rig populations are still overwhelmingly white and male. Transocean and other companies have made some advance in diversity in recent years, but the largest incidence of women and minorities still occur in the catering staff. Given the relatively low salaries and long hours, many of the catering positions are filled by people who come from impoverished backgrounds and have few other options. On some rigs, the caterers, hired and managed by a subcontractor, remain permanently on the edges of rig life, never really thought of as part of the crew. But some crews make a point to include the cooks and waiters and janitors, inviting them to
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