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Drilling Deep in the Bakken: A Year of Grit, Cold, and Connections

Drilling Deep in the Bakken: A Year of Grit, Cold, and Connections

In March 2014, after a year stint herding buffalo on the Great Plains Buffalo Ranch, I stepped into a new chapter as an independent contractor for Fuse Enviro, working as an environmental engineer on the Bakken Oil Field in North Dakota.

My job was to separate organic material from drilling fluid, a viscous lifeline that kept the drill bit and pipes lubricated as they plunged over 20,000 feet into the earth. The work was grueling, the landscape unforgiving, and the cold relentless, but the camaraderie and fleeting escapes to warmer places like Nokomis, Florida, made it a year I’d never forget.

Life on the rig followed a rhythm: 20 days on, 10 days off. While most of the crew—young guys in their 20s and 30s—worked 12-hour shifts, swapping out like clockwork, I was often the graybeard among them, bringing a bit of seasoned perspective. We lived on the rig’s perimeter for those 20 days, a self-contained world of steel, mud, and determination.

One of my drone shots of rig.

Inside my orange Fuse unit! Filled with centrifuges, pumps, conveyors and electronics. The floors clean in this picture and sometimes I seen it with 4 inches of crude and it was everywhere and yes it was my job to clean it up.
Not one ounce of crude oil could leak out of this unit and go on the ground and if it did it had to be sucked up by these huge vacuum cleaners that we would have to use to vacuum up the oil or any other contaminants that fell on the ground and put back an absorbent material and left like this picture.

The work was technical—managing the separation of organic waste from the drilling fluid to ensure environmental compliance—but it was also a test of endurance. The fluid, pumped from unimaginable depths, carried the weight of the earth’s secrets, and I was there to keep things clean and safe.

My Orange Fuse Enviro Unit

Winter in the Bakken was brutal. When I started in March, the cold was already biting, but by December, it plummeted to 40 below for two weeks straight. I’d invested $2,400 in fireproof, cold-weather gear—insulated bibs, boots, jackets, wool socks, even long underwear—to survive the bone-chilling winds.

-30°

Those layers were my armor against the elements, but nothing could fully prepare you for the relentless freeze.

The rig wasn’t all work and frostbite. When we pulled pipe—a marathon process of hauling 20,000 feet of pipe from the ground to replace a drill bit—we’d sometimes get a rare break.

I often use these times or these breaks to go shoot photography of the local area and these happened to be some of the best photography I’ve ever shot.
Just shooting farmsteads or just junk equipment that was laying around I had a blast with my 35 mm.

Those were the moments we’d pile into a truck and head to town for supplies, a hot steak dinner, or just to feel like humans again. I seized those chances to explore, capturing the raw beauty of the Badlands with my camera.

I’d shoot photos of the endless horizon or the rig’s towering silhouette, moments that grounded me in the vastness of the place.

Morning Sunrise and shift change! Even though I worked a 24-hour shift for my 20 days on call I still got to see the morning sunrise.

My 10 days off were a lifeline. I’d fly to Nokomis, Florida, trading the icy plains for sandy beaches and warm Gulf breezes. Those visits weren’t just escapes; they were a glimpse of a future home.

Landing in St. Pete, Fl

I’d reconnect with friends, soak in the sun, and recharge before diving back into the rig’s grind.

My living quarters inside my trailer.

My trailer on the rig was quite comfortable, especially because I didn’t have to share it with anybody else. It had all the amenities of Home refrigerator stove laundry it had bunk beds in it but at least there was nobody else and it’s on private bathroom with a shower.

It also had a really nice work desk that we could do all of our inside work office work on this is where I did a lot of website design at the time too during my call it off time when I wasn’t out in my unit.

We spent countless hours of tearing down the rigs moving and setting them back up and this was a very laborious task.

here’s one of the rigs tip completely horizontal and then we would disassemble everything.

By January 2015, after the rigs shut down under Obama’s policies on December 24, 2014, I made Nokomis my permanent base, a decision shaped by those warm, fleeting visits.

The heart of the Bakken wasn’t the rigs or the cold—it was the people. I built bonds with the crew, especially a driller from Washington state and another contractor from Denver both young guys.

We’d swap stories during downtime, their youthful energy clashing with my hard-earned wisdom. Those connections, forged over shared meals and long shifts, lingered long after the rigs went silent.

When the layoff came, it was abrupt, but the year left its mark. The Bakken was more than a job—it was a test of resilience, a gallery of stark beauty, and a reminder that even in the harshest places, you can find warmth in friendships and the promise of a new home by the sea.

These memories back in 2014 working on the Bakken oil field I will never forget. These were some of the best days of my life and some of the hardest work and some of the most severe weather I’ve ever put up with or tolerated, but I’ll never forget them.