OFFSHORE AND DIRECTIONAL DRILLING

 

 

curve. By using this directional drilling, it is possi­ble to set the rig up on shore and curve the hole out to offshore oil sands.

When the field is so far from land that this is impossible, another method is used. Great steel platforms are built on tall steel legs driven into the sea bottom. These platforms, high above the storm­iest waves, are large enough to hold all the equip­ment.

MARINE PLATFORM

All supplies, as well as crude oil, when it is found, must be transported to shore in boats and barges. Sometimes it is possible to lay an under­water pipeline through which crude oil is carried from field to shore.

 

Drilling for Oil

Oil may be found under the plains of the U.S.A. or Canada, where a lone derrock overlooks the wide fields right, or in Alaska where the derrick, at right, had to be covered against the icy cold.

This oil field in the Turkmenian Republic, the former U.S.S.R.. seems to be on a sea. but it is realK a sea ol sand.

 

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have a hard time arranging to drill in such places, for people do not like to have their well-cared-for property dug up, or live too close to an oil well.

These old "desert ships", not a bit bothered by the newfangled steel towers around them, drink water from the same well used a century ago when they, and only they, made up the great caravans that proudly carried all things across the desert wasteland.

Usually when one derrick appears on the landscape, many more soon follow, and the "strike" soon becomes an oil field. In places far from cities and towns, like the Arabian desert, at left, camps grow up around the oil wells, and workers live right on the spot. But not all oil strikes are on the outskirts of towns, in the desert or on farmland. In California, U.S.A., for example, oil has been found in the middle of cities, and under private estates and golf courses. Oil companies

 

Drilling for Oil

Here, modern "ships of the desert" -tractors and machines - are towing a drilling rig across a desert in the State of Kuwait which lies between Saudi Arabia, Iraq, and Iran.

km.

 

 

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Above, an offshore platform and drilling barge in Japan combine derricks and some refinery machinery. Below, the stormy waters of the North Sea are a base for oil and gas operations which are carried on in all kinds of weather. Platforms are serviced by boats bringing men, materials and supplies.

 

 

Drilling for Oil

Here, at Lake Maricaibo, Venezuela. S.A., you can see one of the most famous water oil fields. In recent years a method of drilling slantwise has been developed which makes it possible for several drills to work from one platform, so the number of individual derricks needed at sea now has been cut down. The slantwise method is somewhat troublesome on land. There it could be used to reach oil under next-door property that does not legally belong to the company drilling.

Left, a fish rests on some underwater pipings set directly on the ocean floor off California, USA. Many deep-sea divers are needed to build and help maintain oil machinery underwater. The divers working on pipes like these often wear several sets of heavy woolens, and warm surface air is pumped through their diving suits, it is cold on the sea floor.

 

Chapter Three