A couple examples of oilfield driving.

They have plenty of wells in ND especially on the Indian res in Newtown and south of newtown in the badlands were you get pulled up and lowered down with a dozer and manadtory chains on steers, truck and trailer. Not to mention defrost season....(worst time of year...its all ****** MUD to you knees) Not many cliffs but plenty of drop off's and poorly built roads. The roads are wide for the most part.

The thing that makes ND hard is you are so far away from help lots of times, your on those roads for hours at a time with no signs, no facilities for miles and it gets so dam dark (there is some scientific reason for the extreme darkness just can't remember what now) and cold in the winters, -60 is the worst I ever seen. Wells in PA are close to help and you don't drive on unpaved roads for 50 plus miles at a time.


So the hills might not be as many and they might not be as many tight turns but it is plenty hard to drive in ND.

Biggest problem I ever seen was getting help. If you get hurt at night somewere and call 911 (if you have signal) they might be an hour or two away before they get to you or if you are lucky they can life flight you within 45 min. But once you look at the whole deal you could end up 2-4 hours before you actually set foot in a hospital to get proper treatment.

Example.....A guy I worked with watched a kid roll his pick up just south of Newtown on 22 (?). The kid got ejected and died. Our driver had to flag someone down to go call for help cause he didn't have signal. He sat there with the kid as he lay there dead for over an hour before some ambulance and tribal police showed up. He quit a week later and went home.

Another good example is that ND's fire departments are all volunteer and poorly equip. If you wreck a truck, like a buddy of mine did, and your hauling crude....they cant do anything other then cordon it off and let it burn off. This pic below resulted in several deaths and a lengthy trial....

Another example is if you burn a well up they can't put it out like they can in PA.

The rates are also better in ND for oil and sand from what I have seen.
I worked for a company that had sand trucks in PA and in TX and ND (were I was) and the rates were always the best in ND. Not sure what oil pays in PA but in ND it was hoovering around 2,50 a BBL when I was there. Depending on distance. SOme were as high as 7.50 per bbl for high H2S oil that were 100 mile runs. Those were nice to get every once in a while. But Plenty dangerous.


PA is like a rally race. Your always shifting up and down and turning the wheel. You need 4;10 gears and a 18 speed to drive the wells in PA.

You can get buy with a 10 speed in ND and 3.33 gears. But you need tall rubber and you need lots of tools and first aid stuff with you and not to mention food and water. ND is more like nascar. Doing 75 all day pulling 270 bbls with a 4 axle trailer and 4 axle truck. Many times i weighted in at 140k on those roads all chained up....Thats what makes ND a pia...LOL But also paid well.

Each place has a plus and minus. Our turn over was massive also. Especially in the winter when you had to chain steers and couldn't shut your truck off cause it would gel in 10 minutes and not start.

SO both places are plenty tough in their own right. But I rather be 20 minutes away from a populated area then 2 hours on dirt road.

JMO from 2 years of being out there.

 

here is a video a put together of pics I racked up over two years. I have lots of videos that Im working on one day editing and posting them up. But this is just some of the bs I saw and dealt with out there.

 

Thanks for the personal insight. I've done rig sites in Pa. but mostly WV rigs. Some of those rigs are just as you say....miles and miles from anywhere and I have driven 50 miles into the mountains on roads that weren't made for little vehicles let alone our big trucks. While I haven't driven 50 miles on dirt paths I have driven 20 miles off road to get to rig sites and many of them are so far back in the hollows and mountains it starts getting dark after 2 p.m. because of the sun setting behind the craggy mountain tops. Our rigs are on roads where speeds are sometimes idle speeds, not much faster.
We too deal with the dust. The rainmakers help but need to be out all day to be effective. You know exactly what I'm talking about.
I wasn't trying to take anything away from you guys at all I just had to comment on the specific road in the posted video. I wish my gigs were like that. I should be so lucky. I'm not one of those drivers who get off on the danger. I prefer to minimize it as much as possible but deal with it daily there on the back roads.
I appreciate you sharing your experiences. It doesn't get anywhere near that cold here as what you deal with in ND as you well know. I considered coming out there at one time but fell into my position completely by accident. I'm home most nights and pretty much make my own schedule and earn a fine weekly pay. I'm very fortunate and realize as much.
Once again, thanks for sharing and be safe out there, driver. God bless.

 

bull poop i do not miss LOL Literary lol !

 

My whole driving experience is in the Oil field (water hauler) I miss the job, sure it was risky but that paycheck though.. Mine was gravy compared to north Dakota. I was in West Texas, Big Lake area. They had the SWD with chefs making you lunch and everything, it was freaking awesome! haha. If I was single I'd go up there to ND and try it out. Too bad I had to go back home because it slowed down big time on the Big Lake area, everything is going towards NM now.. north of Pecos Tx..

 

They had to get it from that end because that's the end that faces away from the rig, it's also the heavy end if the would have tried to pick up that tool from the other end that little truck would have never got it at all. Think of the tail roll as a fulcrum and as it takes all of the weight it lifts the truck just like a lever.

Hammer I get your bonus points. I've been pushed up a ramp, pulled up a ramp and sucked myself up a ramp I've also slid off the #### thing with the tool only half loaded trying to control the winches along with getting everything back on the ground without turning over.


Double bonus points if you've been up a 14 ft ramp Canadian style.

 

ouble bonus points if you've been up a 14 ft ramp Canadian style. whats candian style? 1 handed with a timms?

 

...and no lid!

 

That's with a big sow with one winch. You go to the top of the ramp and a gin truck picks the bed truck up level to pull the tool on the bed. Pretty spooky hanging on the end of a line pulling 90k on your bed.