Norwegian Wood - The Beatles

Another forced day at home but with the artex completed in most satisfactory style (Carl Harmsworth 07971918749 for excellent plastering and artexing) and the photo scanning continuing apace, we again rely on the latter for this post. Out of sight and probably out of mind, work onboard the thousands of oilrigs around the world continues without interruption day and night. I was fortunate to spend the final 20 years of my sea-going career on various semi-submersible installation where I was responsible for positioning, ballasting, anchoring, logistics and communications, to name but a few. One of our most challenging jobs was to re-commission the Dolphin Drilling semi-sub

BORGLAND DOLPHIN after a lengthy refit in Dusavik, Norway. Here are a few close-ups of part of that operation.

Tug secured with a stern tow,

all ship shape and Bristol fashion in the Control Room

with at least one person working

while the audience look on!

Pulling off the snow covered jetty.

In mid-harbour and about to face the North Sea.

Once positioned by 3 ocean-going Tugs, 10 of these 22 ton 'Dolphin (no relation) Flipper' anchors are deployed secured to about 2 miles of the hefty chain cable shown here. The whole evolution took about 4 days.

and A LITTLE TASTE of a RIG CHRISTMAS

The aproned Camp Boss looking after his Catering Team

and look what they produced.

 

Yum, Yum and not an alcopop in sight.

High jinx always followed a good Christmas meal, (Dave Penney a 'birding' mate as well)

these being contenders for our own slant of

THE WEAKEST LINK

while being serenaded by the Catering Crew.

The Final Celebration but not on the rig!