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Feb. 14th, 2015 02:06 amTonight I found myself doing a little memory searching that I haven't done in a long time. I reckon it has been at least as long as I've been at United. I found myself recalling experiences and conversations and feelings that I had back in college.
Doing all the reading and researching I've been doing I'm sure probably played a role in facilitating these thoughts. But I also feel like, having been free of the place for a week, I'm finally starting to come back together. I feel very fractured while working there. I can't really explain it any other way.
In some ways, I think I had to essentially kill, or repress, certain aspects of myself...just to handle it.
Consider this. When I started at United, the first two weeks were spent doing very menial and demeaning things. Sweeping roads (seriously.) Standing around all day. Picking up small pieces of garbage (literally, we were expected to pick up even things as small as gum wrappers tucked between pieces of gravel) in the unit batteries. Writing it out like this, it's making me think it's not so far-fetched to consider that the place utilizes the same dehumanization and resocialization techniques that the military does. Is this necessary? Absolutely not. It's not the military. Operations swing shift serves to disconnect employees from their friends and family - it is not a necessity, as there are alternatives, and there's plenty of research demonizing rotational shift work (for various reasons, including health.) Yet it's done, anyway. I didn't really see my friends, and barely saw the parents I lived with, for a year while in operations. My days off were, five weeks out of seven, on odd days. And I usually spent those days preparing for the next shift - which meant trying to adjust my non-existent sleep schedule to yet another schedule, for another week before I did it again.
The same goes for their shaving policy. It is not an OSHA mandate. It may be "common practice" (and I have yet to substantiate that claim by the safety department) in the industry but it is not necessary. If it were, OSHA would make it a legal requirement for the industry. This serves as a form of individuality destruction. That's standard in the military...relatively rare in the working world. Unless of course, you're working for a cult. Yeah, "professional" businesses often have some kind of dress code. But they aren't telling you to shave every bit of facial hair off of your face, and sending you home if you didn't that morning.
After those two first weeks, shutdown started. I don't remember how long it lasted - I think it was about two months - but I didn't have a single day off. I was on ten hour days, seven days a week. Most of that time, I didn't do anything. I was a "fire watch." Demeaning, and not even menial task. My job was to sit there and watch contractors work. They gave me a fire extinguisher. The chances of anything catching fire were slim to none - I think it was more or less, a joke. If something was, by chance, still full of flammable liquid, or vapor was in the air, it probably would incinerate everyone in the vicinity anyway. A little fire extinguisher wasn't going to do anything.
But besides that aspect of it, there were horrifying, perspective shattering experiences. Climbing into the incoming crude desalter for instance - a large, horizontal, cylindrical vessel approximately 100 feet long with a 12 foot diameter. I was going to be sent in with just a respirator - in fact, myself and Jamie were all suited up (not in HazMat suits, as we should have been - but in light, throw-away "tyveks" which were not completely waterproof, and rubber hip-waders.) Luckily, the safety department stopped by to update the sheet on the vessel and sniff it to check oxygen content. We would've both passed out inside of there momentarily had we gone in without full air.
With a hose in tow and a positive pressure respirator on, I climbed into the damn thing. The manway was barely wide enough to fit my shoulders, and I had to get into it via scaffolding, feet first, carrying a 1,500-3,000 PSI industrial pressure washer. Those washers are strong enough to cut off a man's limb, if they are set to a direct jet.
Even after they steamed it and flushed it out, there was still two feet of shit - toxic crude oil and the collected "heavy ends" that concentrated over the past three years of operation - in the bottom of it. A pipe ran down the center parallel with the shit - it was covered in it, too. So were the walls. You couldn't really stand up, because it was too slippery. Jamie and I held on to the pipe and worked our way to the back. This was the first time I ever worked under full air. It was the first time I was ever in any kind of process vessel. The lighting was terrible - we had one Class I Division I fixture inside, and it wasn't really making it any easier. I think the top manway, covered up by a large industrial fan, was offering more light.
Jamie was in front of me, and having just as difficult a time as I was with movement. Except he slipped. He slid down into the sludge and liquid crude, past the top of his hip-waders. I'm sure his skin was covered in the stuff. He stuck around for the duration, but I'm sure he changed clothes afterwards.
We had to blast the walls completely clean. All of them. It took two days, if I remember right. Break and lunch were more a pain in the ass than a relief - removing all of the ruined "protective" clothing, tossing it out, wiping off my neck and other parts of my body that were exposed, and finally getting to eat...for a short time...before suiting back up again. I was barely above minimum wage doing it. I can't believe I did it.
More to come. I don't want to write anymore on this tonight. I have at least two more experiences from that shutdown to share.
I'm 100% certain I'm putting my two weeks notice in. Damn the consequences. I've put up with enough.
Doing all the reading and researching I've been doing I'm sure probably played a role in facilitating these thoughts. But I also feel like, having been free of the place for a week, I'm finally starting to come back together. I feel very fractured while working there. I can't really explain it any other way.
In some ways, I think I had to essentially kill, or repress, certain aspects of myself...just to handle it.
Consider this. When I started at United, the first two weeks were spent doing very menial and demeaning things. Sweeping roads (seriously.) Standing around all day. Picking up small pieces of garbage (literally, we were expected to pick up even things as small as gum wrappers tucked between pieces of gravel) in the unit batteries. Writing it out like this, it's making me think it's not so far-fetched to consider that the place utilizes the same dehumanization and resocialization techniques that the military does. Is this necessary? Absolutely not. It's not the military. Operations swing shift serves to disconnect employees from their friends and family - it is not a necessity, as there are alternatives, and there's plenty of research demonizing rotational shift work (for various reasons, including health.) Yet it's done, anyway. I didn't really see my friends, and barely saw the parents I lived with, for a year while in operations. My days off were, five weeks out of seven, on odd days. And I usually spent those days preparing for the next shift - which meant trying to adjust my non-existent sleep schedule to yet another schedule, for another week before I did it again.
The same goes for their shaving policy. It is not an OSHA mandate. It may be "common practice" (and I have yet to substantiate that claim by the safety department) in the industry but it is not necessary. If it were, OSHA would make it a legal requirement for the industry. This serves as a form of individuality destruction. That's standard in the military...relatively rare in the working world. Unless of course, you're working for a cult. Yeah, "professional" businesses often have some kind of dress code. But they aren't telling you to shave every bit of facial hair off of your face, and sending you home if you didn't that morning.
After those two first weeks, shutdown started. I don't remember how long it lasted - I think it was about two months - but I didn't have a single day off. I was on ten hour days, seven days a week. Most of that time, I didn't do anything. I was a "fire watch." Demeaning, and not even menial task. My job was to sit there and watch contractors work. They gave me a fire extinguisher. The chances of anything catching fire were slim to none - I think it was more or less, a joke. If something was, by chance, still full of flammable liquid, or vapor was in the air, it probably would incinerate everyone in the vicinity anyway. A little fire extinguisher wasn't going to do anything.
But besides that aspect of it, there were horrifying, perspective shattering experiences. Climbing into the incoming crude desalter for instance - a large, horizontal, cylindrical vessel approximately 100 feet long with a 12 foot diameter. I was going to be sent in with just a respirator - in fact, myself and Jamie were all suited up (not in HazMat suits, as we should have been - but in light, throw-away "tyveks" which were not completely waterproof, and rubber hip-waders.) Luckily, the safety department stopped by to update the sheet on the vessel and sniff it to check oxygen content. We would've both passed out inside of there momentarily had we gone in without full air.
With a hose in tow and a positive pressure respirator on, I climbed into the damn thing. The manway was barely wide enough to fit my shoulders, and I had to get into it via scaffolding, feet first, carrying a 1,500-3,000 PSI industrial pressure washer. Those washers are strong enough to cut off a man's limb, if they are set to a direct jet.
Even after they steamed it and flushed it out, there was still two feet of shit - toxic crude oil and the collected "heavy ends" that concentrated over the past three years of operation - in the bottom of it. A pipe ran down the center parallel with the shit - it was covered in it, too. So were the walls. You couldn't really stand up, because it was too slippery. Jamie and I held on to the pipe and worked our way to the back. This was the first time I ever worked under full air. It was the first time I was ever in any kind of process vessel. The lighting was terrible - we had one Class I Division I fixture inside, and it wasn't really making it any easier. I think the top manway, covered up by a large industrial fan, was offering more light.
Jamie was in front of me, and having just as difficult a time as I was with movement. Except he slipped. He slid down into the sludge and liquid crude, past the top of his hip-waders. I'm sure his skin was covered in the stuff. He stuck around for the duration, but I'm sure he changed clothes afterwards.
We had to blast the walls completely clean. All of them. It took two days, if I remember right. Break and lunch were more a pain in the ass than a relief - removing all of the ruined "protective" clothing, tossing it out, wiping off my neck and other parts of my body that were exposed, and finally getting to eat...for a short time...before suiting back up again. I was barely above minimum wage doing it. I can't believe I did it.
More to come. I don't want to write anymore on this tonight. I have at least two more experiences from that shutdown to share.
I'm 100% certain I'm putting my two weeks notice in. Damn the consequences. I've put up with enough.
