The Geo-Hut is adjacent to the derrick, hooked up to electric with heaters blasting 24/7 to deal with deteriorating colder and colder weather.
Snow started yesterday and has laid a six inch blanket atop the Geo-Hut roof. Inside the trailer-office-bunkhouse, one bed is covered with clothes,gear, and Max’s guitar. A sleeping bag is on the other. In a separate room is a desk, a microscope, and a place to spread geological maps. A bag of groceries is on the floor by the front door. There is no stove or frig and an orange portable toilet is at the edge of the drill site,at the field’s edge, and it, thankfully, has paper.
Max has been here several days, arriving after the well was surveyed and spudded. There are long stretches in drilling where nothing happens, then short quick stretches of anxiety or exhilaration when the drill bit enters a pay zone.
This evening, late, the creators of this business plan peer at samples, measure how the interior of the Earth is conforming to their mental picture of it, wait for more samples, decide which zones need to be tested to see if they are to be profitable. This well is the end of a long process of coming up with a prospect, leasing land, selling the deal to investors, lining up a driller, making sure your t’s are crossed and your i’s are dotted, all legal and proper.
We don’t stay all night, have an upstairs hotel room in Benkleman heated with three little electric heaters plugged into the walls. Tomorrow morning, early, we’ll be back to this well site looking for a profitable bottom line..
The oil business is predictably unpredictable, in a predictable way.
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