It's getting hot...

It was about 98 degrees today, with projections of 102 by Wednesday. It is not even May yet. No worries, however...as I am getting very excited about my upcoming trip to Budapest, Prague, and Vienna. Temps there are about at the Morgantownish level. It is going to be 11 days of beer, pork, and some good old fashioned sightseeing. Heck, I am even meeting up with My cousin Erin and Aunt Betty in Prague for a day or so. Good times! I will have plenty of stories and pictures for you when I get back.

So about a week before Jordan I went to a huge Industrial city north of Al Khor (which is about 35 miles north of Doha. This city is huge. It is restricted access. They have a gate just to get into the city. Numerous companies have Liquid Natural Gas plants up here. Very impressive. Anyway, one of the companies had a emergency responder day and we were invited. I thought it was just a meeting, so I was expecting an hour of BS and then head home. Wow, was I wrong. I was attending with out head of Northern Operations and he was running late so we got to the meeting a little after it started. Actually, we missed the Majalis food and drinks they had for us before they started.

We were wisked into this LARGE boardroom, with all kinds of people sitting around. The boardroom table probably seated 30 plus. It was in the shape of a flame (whats that tell you). So today was a "this is how we respond to incidents...in case you have to assist us" "Let us show you all we have" They pulled out all the stops because some of the other LNG companies sent people. This board room was highly electonic..very fancy. They hit one button and the lights went down, floor lighting and house lights were all that was left. Fancy sound system. The works. Wow. After a DVD presentation, and 2 presentations by their CEO and Chief of Fire Safety, we went out for tea. They had a tea and soda room set up with a VERY large table of sweets and assorted foods. The guide told us to not eat too much and save room for lunch.

We headed to the lobby and outside where a full size charter bus was waiting to give us a plant tour. We were driven around the plant and shown all the nooks and crannies. (Jarod and all the PhD boys would have been in heaven) We were allowed to get off the bus at the command center which is a windowless building in the center of this plant. It is like a bunker and a vault all in one. You walk through safe like doors to get in...about 12-18 inches thick. Then through a foyer and another set of regular doors and finally to the command center behind a electrial key card access door. Walking inside it was a pretty impressive system. The consoles were probably 20-25 feet long with about 20 monitors, multiple computers and phones...with one operator. They had 4 of those plus a few extra guys sitting around. They can control every facet of the operation from this room. I found out that we are behind so much concrete and steel not because of security, but because of explosion potential. Since LNG is odorless when mined, then the scent is added, sometimes you do not know if you have a leak. So if the plant blows up, they want to still be able to control things. Good thinking.

After the tour we headed to the fire station. They had a pretty good set up for what they have. The guys were training when we got there (I am sure that was planned) and the station looked like any other fire station.

After the fire house we headed back to the administration building, where lunch was waiting on us. Keep in mind there might only be 20 of us. This lunch was HUGE! They had a wide selection of all the typical Arabic appetizers (hummous, baba ghanous, etc) plus different types of chicken, fish, shrimp, lamb, camel, plus a huge table of desserts. Probably enough to comfortably feet 50 people.

We had a good lunch. After some parting words by the fire chief we were all handed gift bags which included a golf shirt, a hat, pens, coffee mug, keychain, notebook, plus some propoganda. Very cool. It was a heck of an experience. I love getting tours like that I learn so much about processes and stuff.

Anyway, I would have pictures, but cameras are not allowed on site. Actually, no lighters, cameras, matches, etc. anything that could spark. Gas cars are not allowed past a certain point.

I will probably do one more post before I head to Europe! Talk to you soon!