Izzy Money

More Money Than Brains 61 Comments

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Forwarded by a reader in the industry;

The oilfield is a place to make izzy money if you don’t lose it first, while some are asking for their fair share , some are having to lose more than their fair share. There is no royalty rebate on a wrecked truck or izzy money from an insurance company. The price of oil and gas exploration can be high even in a developed country.
(From a collection of 30 wrecks circulating around the oilfield internet.)

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61 Replies to “Izzy Money”

  4. A number years ago or so I worked as a second cook out on a rig camp. While I was there I can remember a Caterpillar sinking completely out of sight in the muskeg. They didn’t even bother trying to get it out, because the rental of the heavy-lift helicopters would have cost more than buying a new Cat.

  6. Kinda puts a new perspective on the term “oil rich” don’t it?
    No wonder the Saudis are doing well, all they have to put up with is heat. Deserts tend not to swallow earth movers whole, as a rule.

  7. The deeps swamps and the permafrost of the North are almost something of a legend, and now I know why.

  8. On the way into Camrose for X-mas shopping on Monday we saw one tandem tanker that had flipped onto its side on the ditch. The very young driver in the back of the police cruiser (yes, we rubbernecked) obviously never learned to slow down for icy curves on the highway.
    Last week I saw another rig parked at the side of the ride with a moose embedded into its grill. Damn thing went pass the grill guard and still wound up in the rad causing the poor driver to lose all of his coolant.
    Definitely not a cheap business to be in, even if insurance is covering much of the repairs.

  9. “izzy money” is what our esteemed Mr. Dion said all northern Albertans should avoid. his version of being on “izzy street”

  11. Ouch, that middle picture, top row brought back memories. I came very close to putting a new rental 4X4 pickup truck in the drink in northern Ontario. A Cat had broken through the ice on a small stream which we thought was shallow. We checked it out and just before driving through my partner thought he would take one more step to make sure. Right up to his waist he went. Lucky day for me.

  13. The “calamities” that your site portrays are not necessarily specific to the oil industry. They’re quite typical of all heavy construction in northern Cdn. environments.
    A typical “tow job” to pull the tanker from the ice (top photo) would add up to tens of thousands of Cnd. Dollars. On the other side of the coin, the towing company, or whoever owns the horsepower to pull the unit out will profit greatly. Money breeds money, etc, etc.
    I have a set photos that date back to 1952 at Atikokan Ont. Pulp trucks fell through the ice, then and now. Towing “Up North” is a very profitable business.

  14. Not just the north either Johhny.
    I can remember quite a few excursions around a lead/zinc mine site here in NS with the 30 tonne haul truck to pull everything from half tonnes to D4 Cats out of whatever predicamnet they managed to find themselves in.

  15. Naw…Can’t buy it…naw these patch grunts got it wrong…the real “izzy money” is being paid to chase booty on a Bali resort beach.

  16. That’s right Johnny J., that “towing up north” is izzy money!
    What the capital costs for the towing equipment? What are the operating expenses per hour? What kind of net on that izzy money?

  17. I challenge Mr. Dion to spend 1 winter in North Eastern BC on a drill rig to verify how “izzy” the money is.

  18. a normal operation in NE BC.
    about 200km of ice road and another 100km of muskeg high grade to a well in Helmet, izzy access, izzy money, izzy work,izzy temperatures ,
    izzy digging for pipelines then
    lines with weights to keep them from floating, not a rock or even gravel for 20 k each side,
    Ft. McMurray, izzy 40 billion dollars , izzy 40 years of technology. izzy -40 C cutting sand and ice .
    izzy academic ivory tower pronouncements to the workaday hoi polloi.

  21. I think Dion was referring to the idea that Alberta could invest in educating its citizens and look more to producing value added products, rather than sending kids fresh out of high school to destroy equipment (never mind the environment) as they search for goop in the ground. Some would suggest that this requires being “innovative” aka “usin’ the ole noggin'”. I agree though, that its not easy money. A good portion of these workers turn to cocaine or other stimulants to keep themselves going, but then that lends itself to the idea that, maybe we should be helping them do something else.

  22. Steve…….If we all did something else….like get a higher education……..who would do all the work for people like you?
    I bet you don’t even pump your own gas.
    Aww walked into that one you take your bike
    Prob the wrong place to defend Dion.

  23. Iron can be fixed and the cost absorbed. The human costs of a life in the patch are much less obvious.
    Of the hundreds of friends and acquaintances that I made in a career in the oilfield service industry I can come up with only a handfull who are married to their first wife.
    Extended periods of time away from home does not lead to matrimonial harmony. That coupled with wild swings in income (feast or famine) adds a level of financial pressure that can further compound marital problems.
    Then there are the physical risks. The rig floor is a dangerous place, broken bones, dislocations, amputations, catastrophic equipment failures and the number one killer…..long work hours and lots of travel.
    More patch workers are killed in vehicle accidents than any other cause.
    Then there are the dangers of alcohol and drug addiction that testosterone fueled young men can fall into.
    The money is great but sure as hell isn’t izzy.
    Syncro

  24. Steve
    You obviously know nothing of what you speak. It takes a team of highly skilled and intelligent men to operate a rig.
    Some of the skills required include advanced mathematical calculations, meticulous record keeping, logistical planning, interpersonal communications, applied problem solving, mechanical maintenance and repair, a working knowledge of hydro-dymanics……
    Try using the ole noggin before you open your yap.
    Syncro

  25. I was going to follow up with what syncro said, but he sort of took the words out of my mouth. I know lots who work in the patch too. Many of them flush their cheques away on drugs, and none are able to hold down a relationship. I think Dion should resign, but I don’t think he meant that it was easy money for the workers, rather it was an easy decision for policy makers. This article is spin more than anything. I’m suggesting that since ALberta is swimming in debt free cash they should be pouring it into diversifying the economy. Lots of countries have used this approach. Hell, Nokia used to make toilet paper. Alberta should be looking to countries like Japan, South Korea, and other non-resource rich developed nations to build toward creating jobs in value added industries that require investment in people than oil jobs do. I’m not saying working in the path isn’t noble, because yes, we all burn oil in one way or another and rely on it, but rather that we should give these people and future generations more choices that give them a chance at a better quality of life.
    And no Jeff K, I don’t pump my own gas, I fish out disgusting and used fryer grease from bins, filter it, and strip off the glycol so I can burn it as bio diesel, arguably a little messier and more involved than pumping your own gas which is the “izzy” way from my point of view.

  26. Yes syncro I do know what you’re talking about. I haven’t worked in oil, but I have worked in mining exploration that involved rigs for core sampling and I’m familiar with the culture around it. Yes it takes *some* highly skilled and intelligent people to oversee things and run the show, but then there are the grunts who fish pipe and all that kind of fun stuff. It’s still noble, hard work, that requires persistence by a certain type of person, but these guys aren’t conducting rocket science. If they were, they wouldn’t be able to polish off a case of beer on the 25 minute drive from the dry camp to the dry site and vice versa, tossing their bottles out the window the whole way I might add.

  28. Steve
    Given your last post…I withdraw my yap reference.
    What you may or may not know is that many who rise through the ranks in the patch ultimately chose higher education based on the real world knowledge they have gained.
    As far as diversification goes…it’s already happening. An example would be the high tech sector here in Calgary that cut it’s teeth in patch related software and has expanded in other areas.
    As far as Dion’s izzy money comments go…..I think he was playing the redneck card…plain and simple. Playing to his base. I have zero respect for that man and barring him running into a burning house to save a set of quadruplets…I never will.
    Syncro

  29. “All these workers living too fast for the easy money in the north, the prime minister-wannabe blasted as Liberal-appointed senators Tommy Banks and Grant Mitchell looked on. It’s not good for the economy.(CNews)”
    Nice try Steve. Your interpretation is, to say the least, quite charitable towards Mr Dion. Don’t worry, this quote will be quite prominent when Dion stops “propping up” the government with abstentions, scandal-hunting and non-policies.

  30. “…the real “izzy money” is being paid to chase booty on a Bali resort beach.
    Posted by: WL Mackenzie Redux at December 5, 2007 12:07 PM”
    You said it WL; I wonder where these guys are getting their izzy money for chasing booty?
    The Canadian Climate Action Network, which includes some of this country’s best-known eco-crusaders, boasted Monday that it was sending 60 participants. Flying those delegates and their confreres from around the world to the remote resort island will generate 110,000 tonnes of CO2, alone. http://www.nationalpost.com/opinion/story.html?id=142367

  31. “Alberta could invest in educating its citizens”
    This is a oft-repeated myth. Canada already has an over-supply of ‘educated’ people.
    Most people I know with B.A. or B.Sc. end up working as secretaries, sales people, data entry clerks, and the like. And many of the educated immigrants we take end up driving cabs or doing telemarketing.
    For each job requiring post-secondary education, we need far more nurses, waitresses, truck drivers, construction workers, etc., and of course, roughnecks. The ‘knowledge economy’ can’t work without them.
    If kids coming of high school cause accidents, what they need is more on-the-job, hands-on training. This is a big problem; too often you’re thrown into jobs for which you had little or no training. When I was young I recall being sent to take a fully loaded 18-wheeler on a 300 miles trip in northern Quebec. When I mentioned I never drove anything bigger than a 4-ton, my boss said, ‘OK, go to the parking lot, do a few turns, get a feel for it, and then you’re good to go’. I got lucky not to kill anyone or myself.

  32. Great pics, ben-deer-dun-dat. Takes all kinds to keep the trains running on time. I’m sure the folks holed up down east now and for the next 3 months, sheltering themselves from the -15 C global warming, winter conditions, appreciate the dedication of the energy workers and grasp the complexities and enormity of being able to turn up the thermostat. LOL

  33. Alright Shamrock, point duly noted. Dion was out of line in that remark for certain, and it probably stems from his lack of experience with anything but academia, like I said though, I think he should resign.
    GreenNeck wrote:
    “Most people I know with B.A. or B.Sc. end up working as secretaries, sales people, data entry clerks, and the like. And many of the educated immigrants we take end up driving cabs or doing telemarketing.”
    This is true to a degree, but the oncoming labour demands due to baby boomer retirement will and already are starting to once again raise the value of undergrad education to the workforce.
    By investing in people, I’m suggesting that you simultaneously invest in other industries. Yes, you see support industries to oil in Alberta, and that’s all fine and well, but it still relies on one resource. I think Alberta would do well not to just rely on producing oil, but rather producing energy. And by investing in people, I’m not suggesting that we should encourage more people to go and get philosophy BA’s (not to say its not somewhat noble in its own way to study for the sake of studying), but we should invest in starting new industries…even if it means government money initially.

  34. To KVB! Capital costs are high everywhere. My friend uses an F-450 Ford “Super Duty.” for normal Saskatchewan city towing. Competition is outrageous. I do however believe that there is good $$$$ in the “great white north.”

  35. Steve
    There will always be a place for tradesmen in this country. Do you know the average age of ticketed crane operators?
    Somewheres in the mid fifties. The demographic impact of the boomers crosses career lines in a proportion that leans towards a shortage of grunts.
    The dot.com bubble and the cry for higher education has left us with a severe shortage of skilled trades.
    My dad took a job this summer in Fort Mac running crane because he was bored, He is retired and is 68. He doesn’t NEED the money but chose to get back out there with the guys.
    They have been begging him to come back ever since….going so far as to offer special camp accommodations.
    My sons are coming of age and the oldest should pursue a career in the arts given his natural ability….the next son has more natural operating ability than his grandfather and the third…well it’s too early to tell.
    Formal education is not the be all and end all. What is more important is that my children develop their skills and interests.
    Which leads me to the education system. I believe that public and personal interests would be better served by allocating chits for education.
    Basically you’re entitled to X number of years of education. How and when you consume these chits is a personal choice.
    I suspect this would lead to more productive individuals performing tasks they are interested in and a shortage of over educated taxi drivers.
    Syncro

  36. The first picture looks like the Top of the World Highway – many a good truck has broke through that ice; when drivers get too close to the edge of the beaten path, they can sometimes go swimming or ice fishing, without a suit or a rod, respectively.

  37. Steve said:
    “And no Jeff K, I don’t pump my own gas, I fish out disgusting and used fryer grease from bins, filter it, and strip off the glycol so I can burn it as bio diesel, arguably a little messier and more involved than pumping your own gas which is the “izzy” way from my point of view.”
    Interesting. Can you explain your process please? Uneducated me prefers to strip the glycerin, aka glycerol. If you’re trying to “one up” someone, you should at least try to get your facts straight.

  38. @Steve:
    Before pushing a measure, it’s worthwhile to look at how that measure’s turned out when it’s been tried. “This time, it’s not going to be different” adds a lot of common sense – and not just in politics, either. In the investment field, assuming that it’s gonna be different this time ’round is known as the “New Era delusion.”

  39. Felis corpulentis said:
    “You said it WL; I wonder where these guys are getting their izzy money for chasing booty?”
    Well we all know the funding came from misrepresenting realities to gullible donors.
    My actual point in contrasting “Bali beach booty chases” against oil patch grunts (which seemed to get deeply buried in my typical cynicism), was that there are now 2 classes in this nation…a true working class which is payin’ the bills, and a non value added political class which serve a parasitic life feeding on private sector workers productivity, yet sneering down their elitist noses at the culture and political will of the working class.
    Let’s face it, the Dips abandoned the worker for foamy mouthed leftist fringe politics a decade ago and the Liberals are nothing but bureaucratic class goldbricks who hold working class moderate populism in contempt and follow the agendas of their transnationalist Druids.
    The productive working class has NO friends on the opposition side of the federal house…or in any of the frivolous voguish progressivist lobbies which play to nanny state parties.
    Nothing made this “class” gap more self evident to me than the smugness of parasitic booty chasers on Bali beaches who are totally oblivious to the working class culture at home who struggle to make a livlihood against the hazzard/burden of the Northern Canadian winter.
    This Socratic irony brings out truly corrosive cynicism in me 😉

  40. Green neck and I agree on one:
    “”Alberta could invest in educating its citizens”
    This is a oft-repeated myth. Canada already has an over-supply of ‘educated’ people. ”
    Correct! Alberta, and Canada need engineers, industrialists, skilled tradesmen and industrial technicians…we have too much “liberal arts” non value added trash cluttering up the job market….if you want productivity, you educate people in the productive “arts”.
    A BA or BSc do you no good when the plumbing is broken or you need a house or factory built or you need resource extraction support technology

  41. WLMR
    There is indeed a harsh distinction between the theoretical relativists and the practical protagonists.
    Real life occurs where the rubber meets the road.
    Syncro

  42. Alberta has the highest educated and youngest population of the whole country. they tend to be engineers and techs etc, a little light on the interpretive dance and poets, but they can get most of that on youtube.

  43. WLMR at 4:12:”My actual point in contrasting “Bali beach booty chases” against oil patch grunts…was that there are now 2 classes in this nation…a true working class which is payin’ the bills, and a non value added political class which serve a parasitic life feeding on private sector workers productivity, yet sneering down their elitist noses at the culture and political will of the working class.”
    You could add that, to the extent the booty chasers are doing more than just chasing booty in Bali, they are likely actively working against the interest of those private sector workers, literally biting the hand that feeds them.
    With regard to who is funding their expedition to paradise, I am interested in knowing to what extent I am, unwittingly and unwillingly, one of those gullible donors. But that’s a topic for another thread.

  44. I have worked in the oilpatch since I was 16 yrs old. When you have activity happening with heavy equipment, shit happens”. They like Albertans world wide because 90% of can change directions on a dime and give them change. Alberta has changed there attitude since the bust in the 80″s. A lot of are consultants with our own companies, “that are not drawing UIC”. A lot of us have not had the education that a lot of people expect us to have. But we still can compete with the best of them because nothing was handed to us on a plate. We have earned our way up to supervisory positions. We had great education from people in the industry and damn proud of it. It is not the easy life that “Dion” thinks it is. The dumb f*** isn’t even a good politition. And by the way we were diversifying in Alberta by building better roads, schools, hospitals and “maybe throwing money at the people in the shelters when we get drunk”. We have the best of heavy duty equipment to get the job done. When it comes to ordering equipment 75% of the towns have it on hand and with people to operate it. I just hope that Saskatchewan will have that in future. The industry has given people wages earned, lifestyles that they wanted, retirement planned out. It has saved many small towns, farms and small business. I or my friends have never been hungry or without a roof over our heads. Merle Underwood

  45. sorry srw, you’re right, it is glycerin or glycerol, take your pick in semantics. In writing replies here, I am usually quickly jumping in between this and work and can be prone to such errors. I don’t believe if effects the merit of my argument in any way. Jeff K, was suggesting I’m too good to pump my own gas, and in effect I told him that not only is that not true, but I actually make my “gas” before I pump it.
    In any regard, I really wish people on internet message boards(myself included at times)would talk to each other as though they were face to face. So much internet discourse is of such a rude nature, probably due to misinterpretations on tone most of the time.

  46. Thanks Kate for SDA. It has kept me entertained all day. -20*c with the wind howling. Stove is full of wood, salmon and shrimp is going to be cooked tonight, witch I caught taking customers out to Prince Rupert and writing off the whole trip. Listening to the hockey games. Read SDA all day, made sales calls trying to find a completion job. All this done and only having a grade 9 education. The computer opened a whole lot of the media to ordinary person. Merle Underwood

  47. Let’s face it, the Dips abandoned the worker for foamy mouthed leftist fringe politics a decade ago… says WLMR.

    A decade ago? It’s more like four decades at least. The 1970s NDP in B.C. destroyed the mining industry with relish, among many other crimes against the living standards of Joe and Jane Average.
    I nitpick because, as far as the points you make are concerned, I couldn’t agree with you more.

  48. Merle said:
    “When you have activity happening with heavy equipment, shit happens”
    Yep. A friend of mine working in oil patch equpment procurment said insurance on HD equipment ourstrips the capital outlay within the first 2 years…if it lasts that long.
    Merle also said:
    “Thanks Kate for SDA. It has kept me entertained all day. -20*c with the wind howling. Stove is full of wood, salmon and shrimp is going to be cooked tonight”
    Ya. but tell me ya got just a little bit of envy for those parasites we paid to go chase booty on the Bali resort beaches and ponder how to further impoverish us under the ruse of catastrophic global warming?
    Or maybe your one of those honest people than find it more important to sleep soundly at nught ans stare at yourself in the mirror without a flinch of guilt. 😉
    “Now look at them yo-yo’s that’s the way you do it…Money fer nuthin’ and yer chicks fer free…Now that ain’t workin’ that’s the way you do it”
    (Mark Knopfler)

  49. ahk i did it again..the last post I wrote had the name “srw” which is who I was intending to reply to…not sure what I’m thinkin today.

  50. John B: We checked it out and just before driving through my partner thought he would take one more step to make sure. Right up to his waist he went.
    Was your friend Yoda?

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