The Parkland Institute

Women and work

Roughneck, bruised head

A tale of women, toughness and safety in Alberta's gas fields

Chantal Desharnais is no stranger to the outdoors or manual labour.

The 24-year-old Quebecker had previously worked in construction and once spent a summer picking fruit for income on the banks of a B.C. river. Despite this, she had reservations about going to Calgary to work in the natural gas industry for the summer.

It was the moral dilemma of working in an industry she had ethical disagreements with, and not the physical labour, that concerned the university student. However, as many before her, the lucrative work would allow her to make enough money to cover her tuition and help with student loan debts.

But while she was prepared for the physical rigour of the work, Desharnais never expected the sexism she would face or the serious injuries she would sustain. After one month on the job, she would need to be transferred to an office job in Calgary after suffering a concussion, receiving five stitches to the back of her head, and severely spraining her shoulder.

Despite what seems to be an ample need for workers in the Alberta oil and natural gas fields (the natural gas industry in Canada alone employed 151,327 people in 2006 and is growing), Desharnais found it difficult to get hired once she hitchhiked her way out to Calgary. Company after company refused to grant her an interview.

While most companies were coy about the reasons why, she says it was clear that they weren’t interested in hiring women. Eventually, however, she started asking companies outright if they had a policy of not hiring women. While she says she sensed hesitation when she first contacted Geokinetics, her eventual employer, their human resources and personnel manager claims the company never refuses to hire women.

“We never refuse to hire someone if they are a woman - we’re an equal opportunity employer,” says Stephen Menchuk, who hired Desharnais and is familiar with her case.

Interviewed at the end of June, Desharnais was at work by the beginning of July, flown out to the base-camp in Grand Cache, Alberta, where the geological exploration company was checking for natural gas deposits. She was one of only two women on the crew, and says she felt it right away. Beyond what she saw as a culture of "only the tough survive," the fact she is a woman seemed to make it all that more thrilling for others to see her fail.

"As people get off the bus, you can tell they’re judging how long they’ll last. Once you’re there for a while, you start to hear the comments too. It’s especially hard for women."

The challenges started almost immediately, she says. For the first two days she worked with the other rookies on the line crew, following the machines clearing brush to lay the explosive line behind it. But on the third day, she was sent out as a trouble-shooter alongside a 15- year company veteran known for taking few breaks and working long hours.

While line crew follow tracks already cleared by machine, trouble-shooters clear their own path, going from one trouble spot in a detonation line to another. By the end of the day she was exhausted and demoralized.

Upon returning to the camp, two of the older colleagues asked how her day was.

"When I told them I was out with Paddy, they burst out laughing, like it was some inside joke," she says. None of the other new employees were sent out as trouble- shooters.

Despite the tough day, Desharnais stuck with it and was eventually transferred to work with someone a little more easy- going. Then, towards the end of the month, she was transferred back to line crew. While the work atmosphere was still far from comfortable, she felt the worst had passed. But after only three more days on line crew, she was once again unexpectedly reassigned, this time as a shooter’s helper.

But according to Menchuk, there was another reason for her constant reassignment.

"I didn’t want to tell Chantal this to her face, but I’ve been told that she just couldn’t handle the work out in the field. She isn’t very big and it’s tough work carrying 30 pounds of equipment through the field and up mountains. I was told she just couldn’t keep up. Transferring her to shooter’s helper was to give her a chance; she would just need to follow behind and clean up after him."

But Desharnais says she was constantly at the head of her group and was told, along with one other colleague, to slow down so the others could keep pace. And while working as a troubleshooter or a shooter’s helper meant carrying less equipment, it wasn’t easier in terms of cardiovascular demands or the safety issues involved.

"It was clear that they wanted to put me in a difficult position," she said.

The job of a shooter is to detonate underground explosives sending out seismic waves to see if there are gas or oil deposits; a shooter’s helper is a kind of a sidekick, helping to set up the area, and clear away the wires after the explosion. Desharnais was assigned as a shooter’s helper in the morning, and, according to her, was not given proper training except for one colleague who offered her some advice on what equipment to bring.

According to Menchuk, all employees receive internationally recognized training at the beginning of their employment and are updated in the field. While he wasn’t on the ground in Grand Cache, he says he couldn’t imagine someone being sent out without proper training.

Attempts were made to contact Desharnais’ on-site supervisor, but Menchuk said he is currently out of the country and not available for comment.

Upon arriving on site her partner, the shooter, had no time to show her the ropes, says Desharnais. After being dropped off by helicopter, they walked half-an-hour into the bush to the site where they would be detonating explosives. When one of their two walkie-talkies died, the functioning one was given to her partner. She stayed back while he went to lay and detonate the explosives. All along, however, she assumed she would receive some kind of warning that the detonation was about to go.

"All of a sudden the explosion went off, with debris in the air. All I remember was being hit in the head and the shoulder," she says.

While Menchuk says he was informed she was 30 metres from the explosion (the required distance) and behind a tree, Desharnais says she can’t really be sure how far she was because she was never signaled where the explosion was coming from. Upon returning to find her, her colleague radioed in that she had been injured.

"But he would only say I had hurt my shoulder, and not that I thought I was hit in the head. He told me the blood on my neck was just from scratching it on branches when I fell," she says.

"Even I didn’t really know the extent of my injuries until I got into the helicopter, but I knew I had hurt my head,” she continues. “It was only once I saw the look of the pilot when I took off my helmet in the helicopter and the blood started going everywhere.”

The impact of the collision with the rock had cracked part of her helmet and cut her head badly enough that she would need five stitches once back at the base-camp, and would eventually be diagnosed with a severe concussion.

Menchuk says this type of injury is rare and a first for a shooter’s helper (Desharnais disputes this and says she had been told of others being hurt in the field).
"We do everything we can to ensure our employees' safety," he said. "But as I tell everyone, in the end you need to be aware of your surroundings. No one wanted Chantal to get hurt, and we’re sorry that she did."

Desharnais sees something more troubling. She feels that if she was a man perhaps her co-worker would have paid more attention when she said she had injured her head and not just her shoulder. "They just seem to think you complain for nothing."

Menchuk agrees that it is not always easy for women in the oil industry.

"It’s both the work and the atmosphere," he says. "You’re sending out a woman with a crew of 50 other guys. Issues come up, things like separate bathrooms and you need to share with the cooking crew because there are only three toilets on site."

Diagnosed with a sprained shoulder and receiving five stiches to the back of her head, it was unclear for three days, before she was able to return to Calgary, whether she had a concussion. While she was X-rayed in Grand Cache, there wasn’t a head trauma expert at the hospital who could tell her the extent of her injuries.
Desharnais’ troubles didn’t end with the injuries. According to Menchuk, Desharnais “declined” to go back out to the site when safety personnel went with her partner to examine the area in order to file an incident report. Desharnais remembers it differently.

"They asked if I wanted to go with them, and I said, 'Yes.' I wasn’t feeling well [from her injuries] and went to lie down. I found out later that they had gone without me.” The ensuing reports, except for the one she wrote herself, were based mostly on the shooter’s account of the incident and downplayed the lack of training she received and the lack of communication on site. She still has copies of the reports she refused to sign because of her disagreement on the facts.

It is clear that many may think that Desharnais’s complaints are simply sour grapes because she was hurt on the job. Menchuk claims he isn’t sure why she is still pursuing the matter.

"We treated her the way we would treat any employee. She decided to quit her modified work load [an office job in Calgary given to her at full pay after her injury] and go back to Grand Cache to try and convince her supervisors to change their reports. We’re sorry for what happened, but there isn’t much we can do now."

But in an industry that is continuing to grow, Desharnais feels stories like hers need to get out. It isn’t about the fact that the work is hard, she says, or even that she got hurt. It’s about the fact she wasn’t properly trained and her safety wasn’t ensured in the field, something she believes is largely because she is a woman.

"I may keep looking into this and talk to lawyers. But really I just don’t want to see this happening to anyone else."

This article first appeared in the Dominion newspaper, Nov. 27, 2007.

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