Tanking crude oil in Oklahoma and the Texas Panhandle...

If you are in Canadian the place to eat is The Cattle Exchange. It's a little pricey but they give you free bread pudding at the end which will make you slap yo mama!

 

Hey Tall,

I've met some other musicians out here doing the same thing you are trying to do. You are getting into this at a good time and a good time of the year I might add. Been seeing a lot of demand for drivers!

If you are just coming out of school tanking crude will be hard to get into unless you had some previous trucking experience in your past. Most want you to have 1 year exp (mainly for insurance purposes), a few might take you at 6 months if you have a squeaky clean record. If an O/O wants to give you a job I would be skeptical. I have heard some good things and some horror stories, mostly when it comes to equipment or pay. On the equipment side they usually try to shove you into some junk. On the pay side they will hold your money back for a few weeks, then maybe you get paid.

If you have no exp and you want to tank crude I only know of a couple of options- Schneider or Sunoco. You will not be in the perfect place with either choice but once you get 6-12 months you can make a move. After you have 12 months hauling crude you can land a new job in about 24 hours. I have made 3 calls in the past week just shopping around to see what I am worth and all 3 would like to hire me. So go one place, stick it out for 6-12 months, don't job hop, just suck it up and do the work if you can get it. There will be drivers there who have hauled crude for years. These people are great to learn from so ask questions while you have them available.

If you can't get a crude hauling job, try to land a production water hauling job. At the oil lease where we load crude, water is also produced by the same well and flows into a tank which must be emptied- production water. You load that stuff and haul it to a disposal site. This gets you running the same routes and working at the same lease sites as a crude hauler. After you do this for 6 months start putting out some feelers to some crude hauling outfits.

By the way, love me some Buddy Guy. Got to see him perform about 7+ years ago and he came right out into the audience and played 2' from me. Now THAT was some PURE ENERGY!

 

It's a global market with lots of demand coming for emerging markets and the good old US Dollar, well she ain't what she use to be! I can't think of too many items we purchase which have gone down in price.

The photo below states it well... "In 1964 minimum wage was 5 silver quarters per hour. Today those 5 quarters are worth $26.21 in melt value....We don't need to fix the minimum wage, we need to fix the money!"

 

Just wanted to report crude trucking over in the TX panhandle seems to be picking up as I am spotting a lot more trucks working in the area. We just signed on to a new contract in the area hauling just East of Wheeler, TX down to Ringgold, TX.

Here are some names for you drivers trying to do job research. (Note: at the time of this posting the Sun Coast site appears to be down for the moment)

(listed in order of frequency I spot these trucks)...

Connect Transport
http://www.connecttransportllc.com/

Eastex
http://eastexcrude.com/

Premier
(website unknown)

QC Energy
http://www.qc-energy.com/

Sun Coast Resources
http://www.suncoastresources.com/

Plains
http://www.plainsallamerican.com/

Greondyke Transport
http://www.groendyke.com/

Enterprise Transportation
http://careers.enterpriseproducts.com/go/enterprise-transportation-jobs/286132/

If I missed any let me know. I am mainly spotting these trucks in an area between Canadian TX, Shamrock, TX, and Sayre, OK.

 

Here are a few more crude haulers to add to the list. I'm always spotting new trucks!...

Alan Ritchey
http://www.alanritchey.com/

Mission Petroleum Carriers
http://www.mipe.com/index.php?file_id=23

Frontier Tank Lines
http://www.frontiertanklines.com/

Kimrad Transportation
http://www.kimrad.com/index.shtml

Sentinel Transportation
http://sentineltrans.com/

 

In OK I know drivers who make $19-$23/hr hauling crude with overtime available after 40 hrs and working 60-90hrs per week. Also know drivers who get paid by the load, usually 25% which equals out to about $260-$310 per day. Pay by the load seems to work out OK if the company will also pay for break down time or time sitting at a LACT. Otherwise it can be a crap-shoot and I know of some drivers who are leaving one place because they are being forced to go to commission.

In TX I know drivers who make about the same per hour, although South TX and Midland seem to pay a little more. I suspect this is due to the higher cost of living. Try finding cheap housing in South Texas! Just got a report from one buddy, his outfit pays $24/hr but a 2BR house will run you $1500+ per month.

Also consider some places pay a safety bonus monthly or quarterly, some pay for your housing, and I even know a couple that will pay for 100% of your benefits. Got to take the whole package into consideration.