Offshore pilots - not a future profession?

Motox · April 2, 2008

My mom has been working at StatoilHydro for about a year now, and they are really making progress! They have come to the conclution that building the oilrigs under water will increase the oilrecovery by several percent, making billions of extra money. This means that almost all transportation will be by boat. I fear that there wont be jobs left for the offshore pilots, making hondreds of pilots unemployed.

Here is a link refering to this topic http://www.statoilhydro.com/en/TechnologyI...es/default.aspx

AndrewT · April 2, 2008

I don't know much about oil platforms and the construction of them, but I'd imagine that I'd take quite a number of years to replace all platforms...and considering that this is a brand new technology, I really find if hard to believe that an entire industry would change in any quick fashion.

Motox · April 2, 2008

I don't know much about oil platforms and the construction of them, but I'd imagine that I'd take quite a number of years to replace all platforms...and considering that this is a brand new technology, I really find if hard to believe that an entire industry would change in any quick fashion.

I agree, however, I've got the impression that the oilrigs won't be replaced, but all the new oilrigs will be subsea. This might happend through 10-20 years, but there will be lots of pilots in 10-20 years.

NorCalHeliKid · April 2, 2008

Anyone know where I can go to submarine school?

BOATFIXERGUY · April 2, 2008

Anyone know where I can go to submarine school?

Well of course! Try the US Navy. I hear they have a pretty good submarine program.

NorCalHeliKid · April 2, 2008

Well of course! Try the US Navy. I hear they have a pretty good submarine program.

Thanks BFG, I enlisted today. I told the recruiter that the idea of being stuck on a small, submerged, nuclear powered ship with a group of sailors was my idea of heaven. He agreed, weird!

BOATFIXERGUY · April 3, 2008

Thanks BFG, I enlisted today. I told the recruiter that the idea of being stuck on a small, submerged, nuclear powered ship with a group of sailors was my idea of heaven. He agreed, weird!

AndrewT · April 3, 2008

Thanks BFG, I enlisted today. I told the recruiter that the idea of being stuck on a small, submerged, nuclear powered ship with a group of sailors was my idea of heaven. He agreed, weird!

All male sailors, unless the Navy changed things

Oil Pilot · April 3, 2008

The idea of sub-sea wells is a good one and one that is being pursued in the deepwater. The shelf production platforms, where 90 percent of the small ship activity takes place, aren't going anywhere for a while.

The oil companies will not spend the billions of dollars it would cost to convert the platforms to sub-sea wells when it is a given fact that the shelf oil supply is getting smaller and smaller. When the shelf completely dries up, you will have a large change in the number of jobs out here for the small ship driver. I would imagine that the number of jobs will stay the same or increase in the coming years. Even though the shelf area is producing less and less oil, they are still looking for and finding new areas to drill.

As the number of deepwater platforms increases, the need for large aircraft will increase. Yes, they may use the boats once people get out there for maintenance on the wells, but no one wants to ride a boat for 36 hours just to get out to work and it's just not feasible or economic. There will have to be a central living quarters where people are based out of in order to maintain the wells and there will have to be transportation between there and the shore that is economical and timely.

I wouldn't count out a career in the gulf during our lifetimes.

Gomer Pylot · April 4, 2008

The deepwater GOM, where much of the current activity is taking place, and where the use of undersea wells will happen, is well over a hundred miles from the beach, and the beach is far from the nearest town, in most cases. What is happening is that there are fewer manned locations out there, but the ones there are have many more hands on them. Some of those installations have several hundred people on them all the time. Those people aren't going to be riding boats. That simply takes too long and costs too much in overtime pay. Boats cost the oil companies as much as helicopters.

The number of small helicopters has been decreasing steadily for well over a decade, and will probably continue to decrease, but the number of medium and heavy helicopters won't go down much, if at all, and probably will increase.