Aug. 15, 1965, the Red Desert of Libya.
Engineer Bill Sandifer (introduced in Chapter 1, which appeared in this space on May 13) and I, two Norphlet High School graduates in charge of drilling a multimillion-dollar well for Exxon here in Libya, spend a few hours each day talking about folks back home.
Things are pretty grim and unbelievably hot, but the food is a real plus. The rig is French, and it has a French chef. At lunch today the chef told us he has just received his supplies, including what he called a French delicacy: squid. Vertis and I had fried calamari when we once spent a week in Athens, Greece, and discovered it to be very tasty.
It's almost 7 p.m. and we are sitting down to dinner. After an appetizer of whipped cream and onions, the chef brings out the main course. I'm looking for a pile of fried calamari, but instead a whole 18-inch squid is plopped on my plate. Then the chef takes a ladle and splashes a black sauce on top of the squid and says, "Squid in its own sauce."
It really looks gross, and there's a very fishy smell to go with it, but I know I have to try it.
No, no, I can't eat the squid, that bite has stuck in my throat. Bill has just laid his fork down. Yes, the chef is muttering something: "Want hamburgers?"
You would have had to hog-tie me to eat that squid, so I'm quietly answering yes as the French crew gobbles up the squid. I feel like an ugly American, but I don't think many Americans would eat that squid, head and all, like the French crew did.
It's a few days later when one of the Libyans came back with a small gazelle that he managed to chase down with a Land Rover. I don't approve of hunting with a Land Rover, but he dressed the gazelle and took it to the French chef to prepare.
That resulted in maybe the best meal in my life. We're making over how good it was to the chef. He's beaming, and rewards our compliments with a French cheesecake.
I've been waiting for the new drill bit that was put on at 8,500 feet to get dull, which will give me about eight hours free while the crew pulls drill string and changes the bit. I've heard about rock carvings--petroglyphs--made by prehistoric desert people on some cliff walls north of the rig, and I want to see them. As I walk out of the dining hall, I see the drill pipe coming out of the hole, so I'm heading for my Land Rover.
I've been driving for about an hour due north. When I see a ridge over to the west, I drive toward it. Thirty minutes later I'm pulling up beside some impressive outcrops of sandstone where I notice something under an overhanging sandstone ledge. I see a carving. I can make out a stick figure and an animal, which is pretty fat. An elephant?
That's when I see a military looking vehicle heading my way with its lights flashing. What? Algerian Border Patrol flashes through my mind, and after I yell, "Oh my God! I'm in Algeria!" I take off driving east, but they're coming after me.
They're gaining as we head across the flat desert. That's when I hear what might be a gunshot or the Land Rover backfiring, which makes me hunker down and stomp the accelerator to the floor. A dirty, hot Algerian jail comes to mind.
Another noise and then another, and they are about to catch me, but as I dip into a dry stream bed, I turn and roar over a rocky bottom for a few hundred yards, then up the other side. I see them slowing down because there are some good-sized rocks in that stream bed. After another 10 minutes they turn back.
I guess I'm back in Libya.
My hands are shaking as I drive to the rig. The last joint of pipe has just gone in the hole, and the driller has started back to drilling when I hear the rig brake start squealing as the driller eases off of the brake. That means the bit is penetrating rocks that are very porous and easy to drill.
I walk out of the trailer, get the attention of the driller on the rig, and give him a circle sign over my head, which means to stop drilling and circulate while we wait on the samples to come to the surface. From the depth we are drilling it will take about 20 minutes.
I note the drilling mud looks a little frothy and yell to the driller, "Pierre! Gas cut mud! Get ready to close the rams, if it kicks." The first samples are coming to the surface now, and as I reach out to get a handful of cuttings, I can smell oil. I take a quick whiff of the sample and nod; good oil odor. I stick my tongue to the samples, no salt taste; good.
I'm heading down to the mudlog trailer with a bag of cutting to examine under the microscope Fifteen minutes later and I've examined the samples. They have good odor, fluorescence, and oil staining, and I could see porosity in the sample. I walk up to the rig where Bill Sandifer is standing.
"Good show, Bill. We're going to test it. Set the packer at 8,085 feet, 15-minute open, and two-hour final. If you flow oil, reverse it out."
"You got it, Richard, but you're gonna hear that bunch of roughnecks scream when I tell them they are going to pull the pipe again and DST [drill stem test]. Hell, they've been working all day making a trip, and they are about to have another eight hours of the same thing in this heat."
"Yeah, Bill, I know, but with a show like I just logged, the office would have my hide if I didn't test it."
"Oh, I know it, Richard, but this crew has been drilling over in Algeria on field wells, and they never test any of those."
"I think I'll check things out at my trailer, while you tell the driller to come out of the hole for a test."
Bill laughs and I'm walking toward my trailer when I hear a string of what I think are French cuss words. The only word I can make out is "American!"
To be continued in Chapter 3.
Richard Mason is a registered professional geologist, downtown developer, former chairman of the Department of Environmental Quality Board of Commissioners, past president of the Arkansas Wildlife Federation, and syndicated columnist. Email richard@gibraltarenergy.com.
Editorial on 06/17/2018