environment

Vol. 11 No. 1 2004
offshore projects. An oil drilling rig is moving to a new
location, and the rig owner wants to know if there is any
hazard for a leg punch-through during pre-loading. If
the legs break through a thin, hard layer overlying soft
clay while jacking the hull out of the water, the rig may
suffer serious damage. So it is up to the Fugro engineer
and operator to drill a borehole using the jack-up rig's
drill equipment, to evaluate the sub-seabed conditions
real-time and to predict the punch-through hazard, while
the tool-pusher is reminding her that his rig is costing
him $2,000 an hour. Challenging!
Thousand and One Arabian Nights
A third option in quieter times (which hasn't happened
in the last year ☹) is to take a regional holiday. I love
Oman! One of the highlights was a hiking trip in arid
mountains along 1km deep gorges, spending the night
at the highest peak (3009m), passing through remote
villages and being invited for coffee and dates instead
of being thrown at with stones (which I had expected,
since I couldn't get myself to cover my legs and arms in
temperatures of over 40°).
One Arabian Nights.
Women in the Middle East
The inevitable question. No, it isn't that difficult. Not
really different from working in a male dominated
environment elsewhere in the world. Virtually all my mail
is addressed to Mr. Bernice. Everyone always stares.
No female colleagues. Whenever you touch a pipe
wrench, it is being pulled out of your hands.
The few differences in Islamic countries haven't posed
serious problems yet. In Iran I dressed up with long
sleeves and a scarf only, no veil required for Christian
ladies. The Qatar national oil company refuses women
for offshore work, but made an exception when Fugro
insisted there was no other engineer available. Ras
Laffan Industrial City didn't allow women to enter the
Labour Camp (where some 5,000 male construction
workers live), leave alone to spend the night in the Camp.
When I re-applied for accommodation at a higher level,
a foreign manager thought Qatar ready for emancipation
and changed the rules. Security did keep an eye on my
room though! Recently I stopped for two Indian hitchhikers.
The moment they saw the driver, they backed
off! But usually I deal with Europeans or with Arabic
managers who have been educated in the West and
treat me like any other engineer.
All in all, life of an engineering geologist in the Middle
East isn't too bad!
PS. If you want to read more about Oman, email me for
the full travel account.
Figure 3: Green Turtle mommy in Oman
And the turtles are great! Each night Green Turtles come
to lay eggs on the beach at Ras al Jiniz. You can camp
behind the dunes, and at night time the ranger will take
you to the beach. You will see from close by how the
ladies crawl ashore, dig a hole and drop the eggs into
the hole. At sunrise you can go alone and even touch
the turtles while they exhaustedly make their way back
to the sea. Later in the season you can help the
thousands of cute baby turtles survive a bit longer by
directing them to the sea.
Oman's forts are superb too. Some of the medieval forts
are restored and made into a museum. It is so pleasant
to stroll through the cool corridors, see the soldiers
quarters and ammunition stores, the prayer rooms, the
date storage cellars and date syrup jars, the water supply
system with canals and water wells, and the dark
dungeons while recalling stories from Thousand and
Figure 4: drilling rig in Ras Laffan Industrial City
67