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Gold/Mining/Energy : Strictly: Drilling and oil-field services -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Richard D who wrote (46642)	6/19/1999 2:43:00 AM
From: Douglas V. Fant	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 95453

Richard, the good thing about natural gas too is that it is just an explosion hazard. Natural gas tends to burn "cool". For e.g if you have a natural gas fire on an offshore platform,then you can pretty much save the main structure simply by keeping a stream of water on the fire until it goes out naturally.... Oil on the other hand, while it is not an explosion hazard burns "hot". An oil fire will melt down a steel platform pretty quickly. What's even worse is that if you get burning oil on your skin, the burning oil sticks to your skin so diving underwater will not put out the fire immediately! It has to be physically smothered. But the good news is- An oil fire on the surface of water burns "cold" just one foot under water under the flames on the surface- no matter how spectacular the fire looks on the topside- a very important survival tip. If you are offshore in a sinking/burning boat or near a burning platform and a burning oil slick spreads out on the water. Remember to dive about two feet under the burning slick, swim as far as you can, then go into a vertical position. As you appraoch the surface to take another breath take your hands side-by-side, back-to back and rapidly move them in order to create just a little hole in the buring oil. Exhale as you approach the surface, and then just let your lips barely surface and take another breath and dive back under the burning slick a couple of feet deep. in this method you can swim under and escape a burning oil slick literally completely unscathed.... Finally and most important water survival tip of all- if you fly over water or go in boats a lot, put a garbage bag in your pants pocket. If you end up unexpectedly in the water, you can blow the garbage bag up as an inflation device and float on it. Also if you are wounded and trailing blood into the water, you can wrap the wound with the garbage bag and discourage the presence of "curious" marine life. Finally if you are cold, you can punch three holes in the bag pull it over your torso, put your shirt back on, and then retain heat in your body to prevent hypothermia.... But if you are talking about NGL's those are incredibly volatile. I witnessed an ngl leak/explosion in a compressor deck in a gas plant many years ago. I was blown backwards but was OK. The worker nearest the explosion literally had his skin peeled off of his body where he had been wearing a sleevelss tank top shirt and his arms/shoulders were exposed. What was weird was that the explosion/fire was so intense, that when he landed on the ground post-blast and his hands accidentally touched each other, the skin on the fingers of both hands literally fused his hands together- had to be separated in the emrgency room via operation. NGL's are very nasty stuff to work around. But what was truly impressive was that this 19-year old Texas farmboy, with burns over 65% of his body, and who should have died, not only willed himself to live, but returned to work in plants,and has lived pretty close to a normal life, having had three kids etc., and stil works in the oil industry....