who on the forum work offshore? what do you do and do you enjoy it?
im currently looking into it and would like to hear your thoughts on the offshore lifesyle.

a lot of my mates do.

love the money. hate the work.

I work offshore, currently in Norway.

I do – open hole completions / sand control . I like working in the field and quite enjoy the challenge of the rig – fuggin hate the office and pre job planning

Spent 6 months in west africa last year – had its ups and downs – would i go back – **** yeah we had a ball most of the time !- that doesnt mean we got smashed all the tine either – i rarely drink . Spent alot of tine running and seeing the sights – was a relitively safe part o wa – only had a gun pointed at me once 🙂 Learnt alot of spanish there to when speaking with locals

Ps not sure a rotation on the same rig all the time would be that good btw – my work generally doesnt take me to the same rig that often !

2wks on 2wks off on different platforms.
Most of the time the work and time offshore is pretty good, plenty of hanging around drinking tea and eating cheesecake.

demob day arrives and it the best job in the world! 😆

Until the weather is rubbish and you get stuck on rig for an extra weekend or so 😉 Bro works in oil industry, he’s not been off shore yet but some of his buddies have.

What do you do out there el gato ?

Stuck there an extra weeken due to bad weather – yer still on ticket 😉

I just try no to plan shit for te first couple days back !

My last 10 or so jobs were on land rigs in california – was fookin ace few weeks !

Did ten years offshore before moving shorebased. Offshore and oil and gas in general has lots of plus points but a few negatives.

PM me if you want more info. I could give you a heads up on the different areas/positions and what an employer would look for.

Best job in the world when the Parrafin Budgie arrives to take you home! :O)

I work offshore, well services mainly. It’s great most of the time. Varied locations wherever your needed, time off at home when it’s quiet. Moneys good and it’s mostly no stress.

Tried a few different jobs in the past and right now I wouldn’t do anything else.

I would second what futureboy says, (I have not worked offshore but most of the guys I know that are/went offshore look to get back onshore).

TR -inspecting collision tanks, 14 dark days.

Im offshore at present, on a Semisub in Nigeria. Im an Offshore Medic, so ideally i have diddly to do – im usually only busy when someone has injured themselves or is ill. Do i enjoy it? I love the time off, i work 28on/28off, and i earn more than i ever thought possible when i trained as nurse many moons ago. The work itself is a bit dull, and i truly despise the Underwater Heli escape training we have to do every 4 years – the thought of having to do it nearly makes me quit offshore altogether, i hate it.
If i knew 15 years ago what i know now, i would have gone offshore when i was 18, guys of my age, who left school barely literate, now earning £150k+, as Subsea engineers, Mechanics and Drillers. I get well paid, but absolutely nothing near that kind of figure, despite having more qualifications than almost anyone else on the rig. If i didnt have family to support i would go do my Roustabout training and start from the bottom again, there is such a huge shortage that i would overtake my current pay within 5 years as promotion is incredibly quick these days for anyone with half a brain cell.

i truly despise the Underwater Heli escape training we have to do every 4 years – the thought of having to do it nearly makes me quit offshore altogether, i hate it

Aaarghhh – I hate water. Been offshore before HUET was compulsory. If they make me do that now, my resignation will be on their desk toot sweet.

Been offshore before HUET was compulsory. If they make me do that now, my resignation will be on their desk toot sweet.

How old are you!!!! 😉

If you don’t have it these days resignation wouldn’t really be an issue. Certainly not in the North Sea.

i would have gone offshore when i was 18, guys of my age, who left school barely literate, now earning £150k+, as Subsea engineers, Mechanics and Drillers

Who are they working for? I’m in drilling and that is waaaaaay over what we and others i’ve worked for pay Drillers and Mechs (be it UK or international)!

How old are you!!!!

If you don’t have it these days resignation wouldn’t really be an issue. Certainly not in the North Sea.

Very old 🙂 , but that was in 1998.

Some companies have demanded that even shore-workers do HUET, as some sort of solidarity thing. If my employer does that … bye bye!

A friedn recently quit his nice £35k office job to go offshore and get some adventure.

Training – great fun, it’s in Paris for an added bonus.

Money – great, you get a wage and the company basicaly pays for everything he does anyway!

Work – apparently as a trainee you get the crap jobs for 2 years, stick that out and it gets better. He’s working 6 weeks on 1 off, in the soutch china sea doing 12 hour shifts on an acid injection barge. And they canceled his last week off!

Moneys good, but I’ll stick to my office job for now!

so he works for schlumberger then tinas – dont know anyone thats had a good experiance training with them ….

i enjoyed the chopper escape training – i like being in the water though !

Indeed he does.

Recomend any other companies? Or is that considdered the best by virtue of being the worst?

I have considered retraining as an MMO (marine mammal observer), seems to be a good way of getting around the world a bit wherever drilling operations are, and save the whales man. A friend was telling me I could get a job doing it in Libya for £900 a day but then it all went a bit tits up down there!

The people who seem to complain most about Schlumberger are the ones who still work there. I had 5 or so generally happy years with them before a collection of circumstances lead me to decide it was no longer for me. Its a massive company with a huge variation in the roles people do, even the same job title in different countries could be a completely different job.

As far as offshore goes it really depends on where and what you want to do. Don’t assume that you will get much or regular time off, some do lots don’t, and don’t assume the money is going to be amazing.

Also for some reason HR and recruiters fin it difficult to place people’s experience and skills into the correct role, don’t send a cv to a rig company or whatever asking for an offshore job. Decide you want to be a driller, scaffolder, engineer, medic, rov…… And focus on getting that job, paying for your own training where possible.

Oh, and I love working offshore

I spent a few years working offshore in cementing and then coil tubing.
I enjoyed when I was young, single and no kids. The work was good, challenging at times but with a lot of boredom while waiting for the job to start.
I discovered that their actually is a limit to how much porn one can watch.

Once family came along I quit and moved on to something totally different. I couldn’t stand being away from the kids for 2-3 weeks at a time, especially as I wasn’t on a fixed rotation so I never knew how long each trip would be or how long I’d have at home.

The money is good once you’ve built up some experience but IMHO not worth it when you have family.

Until the weather is rubbish and you get stuck on rig for an extra weekend

Can be longer – it too me an extra 2 weeks to get off an acquisition boat in the Atlantic – the weather was too bad for the helicopter to land.
Offshore for a woman can be hard – one of the plus sides is that you get your own bunk and shower (I now know why there are grab rails in the showers on the boats), finding the drawers full of the previous guy’s choice mens magazines is not nice as is the chef trying to marry you off to the Phillipino kitchen hand!
Glad to be office based now.

FIL has been working overseas for years, mainly Yemen and then platforms off West Africa. He’s some kind of Ops Manager. One month on – one month off. Gets paid a lot. Can be very long days though. Plus his platform was hijacked a few months ago with his name on the wanted list – got a bit messy (can’t say anymore than that).

im currently a steel fabricator/welder/fitter, time served and been with my employers 9 years total. im 25 and about to sit my universal offshore training and MIST. im not set on what i want to do really and am not sure if i want to do fabrication/plating. what are peoples views on the best way to go about job seeking? best to just register with agencies or sent out cv’s straight to companies myself. any help much appreciated.
cheers

I’m Offshore!

I’m an Instrument and Systems Technician in the Southern North Sea. I work 2 weeks on, 3 off. We fly out of Norwich. I’ve been Offshore for 4 Years, but I’ve worked in the gas industry for about 11. Our platform has fantastic food, average facilities and moderate levels of pay (for Offshore).

Most days the work plods along at a moderate place, but there can be the odd ocassion where it all get’s a bit tense. (I look after production and safety systems, not nescessarilly in that order)

Although Production is starting to tail off a bit there’s still lots of work in a wide variety of trades.

I don’t like that the turbo trainer in the gym now has a road bike.

I can’t say the survival course is that daunting if you’ve got any cajones. The Fire Team and Freefall coxswain Training were a bit more adrenaline worthy.

OP: Good welders with hydrocarbon pipeline experience are pretty much golden. Construction pipefitters and instrument pipefitters are always in demand too

niversal offshore training and MIST

If you can stay awake during your MIST you’ll be doing well. A duller training course I have yet to be on. Two days of solid powerpoint presentation.

Offshore was what I wanted to do, but with a crappy environmenta degree and no experience there were never any ins.

I doubt at 32 there will be any now.

Quirrel – they love people with environmental degrees as long as they have some kind of practical Health and Safety background to go with them.

32 is more than young enough to go offshore, looking around the average age of the workforce is at least 50 if not a bit higher.

Quirrel – they love people with environmental degrees as long as they have some kind of practical Health and Safety background to go with them.

It’s been ten years since I graduated. There was H7S in it and I did do some EARA and 18001 stuff years ago, but now trained in education.

Where do I with my sort of qualifications start to look for work?€

There was H7S in it and I did do some EARA and 18001 stuff years ago

I have to be honest – no idea what all that means. There are 3 main types of safety people we see out here.

Safety techs who look after Torches, lifejackets fire extinguishers, warning signs etc.

Safety advisors who are essentially a Safety “bobby” looking out for unsafe working conditions, leaks, managing COSHH, risk assessments, waste segregation and accident statistics.

Occupation hygienist types – lloking out for drinking water quality, noise monitoring, chemical monitoring etc. (tend to visit every now and again.

I’m in the gas side of things, I think there’s a greater environmental leaning on oil platforms.

Expect to go in at a basic level, earn reasonably well, then progress should be pretty quick with a marginally relevant degree.

I’d try and speak to people in HR at the big manpower firms, AMEC, Parenco and PSN. Anyone with a bit of common sense a BOSIET, MIST and a banksman/slinger certificate will probably be able to find work even in this climate. (thankfully our company don’t require MIST)

i love just got back into it after some at home last december went out on a job off greenland i forgot what it was like to not have to worry about cash after min wage for 4 years i work in the survey industry as a technical engineer and its always a challenge i do 12 hr shifts as well when not off shore im at the office small firm with low overheads but big margins so any tools i need/want for the workshop i get which helps boss is also getting me a big warehouse/workshop to build up some new camera equipment and new grabs we have been desighning

all i can say is go for it worse case you look for another job when your out there

I’ve been offshore for 13 years now as an ETO (electrical maintenance engineer). 10 years on cruise ships (good work experience, poor pay compared to other sectors), now working for a government research body (better pay, though still poor for the industry, 4 months on/4 months off)
It’s good for having time off to go biking loads as well as now being mortgage free, though after 13 years doing it, you appreciate having missed out on something in life…..

In my exp…
Offhsore Health and Safety Advisors, invariably need a the Nebosh General cert. as a minimum. Looks like a very dull job to me.

Offhsore Health and Safety Advisors, invariably only need a the Nebosh General I’m a bit of a Twunt cert. as a minimum.[s] Looks like[/s] a very dull job to me.

i like it oliver 😀

no one has any thoughts on agencies etc?

I’m a Hydraulics tech working in Norway on a 2 weeks on 4 weeks off rota.
Pay more tax working in Norway, but the union system in Norway is first class & provides excellent benefits.
Just putting the finishing touched to the new rig before starting a 5 year contract, happy days!
Agencies are a very good way to get started, I worked for one for first 2 years. I know that most of them are looking for people right now.

What agencies?

I used to look on oilcareers (i think it was called that)

A lot of the internet ones appear to be – pay us a 100quid and we’ll let you look.