Alberta operations

[Diadem]

What's the busiest time of the year for the oilpatch? Does the season have a significant impact on hiring for Alberta air operators?

[whiteguy]

What's the busiest time of the year for the oilpatch? Does the season have a significant impact on hiring for Alberta air operators?

Starts picking up Oct and Nov. Busiest time is right after Xmas till spring.

[privateer]

As of 2009, there no longer appears to be a season. From what I have seen the only thing that slows down in the summer is the trucking industry. What they can't do we pick up. But the Oil patch has been very consistent the last couple of years. There might be a few more flights before and after the holidays but it usually just means getting 65+ hours a month versus an average 40-50.

[iflyforpie]

Go to the Alberta Auto Trader website. Go to the search function and type in Ford F-350, used. The higher the number of postings, the slower the oil patch is.

[whiteguy]

As of 2009, there no longer appears to be a season. From what I have seen the only thing that slows down in the summer is the trucking industry. What they can't do we pick up. But the Oil patch has been very consistent the last couple of years. There might be a few more flights before and after the holidays but it usually just means getting 65+ hours a month versus an average 40-50.

That's true. We were told to prepare for the slow down in March but it never happened. Actually got busier! This winter is setting up for a busy one!

[ScudRunner]

http://m.theglobeandmail.com/news/natio ... ice=mobile

The whole country is talking about jobs. In Ontario, the provincial election is all about jobs. In Ottawa on Monday, Prime Minister Stephen Harper is beginning the fall season of Parliament, vowing to put his government’s focus on jobs. The official opposition NDP is promising to do the same.

And then there’s Calgary Mayor Naheed Nenshi.

He’s talking about jobs, too. But he’s not worried about how to create them. Rather, he is in the enviable position of worrying about how to fill them.

So with his pockets bulging with job applications, the mayor is heading east this week – to Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal and Halifax. He’s coming to sell university students, business people and politicians on his city as a great place to live and a fabulous place to make lots of money.

“The general sense in Calgary is that we are starting to go into another labour crunch both for people in the trades, but in particular for white-collar workers this time as well,” the mayor said in an interview Friday.

By white-collar workers, he means jobs for everyone from geophysicists to engineers to IT professionals to investment bankers. He’s also looking for young, professional people to come to the city and put down roots.

“So we want to try to get ahead of that as best we can,” he said. Getting ahead of a potential labour shortage meant launching a new campaign in July – “Calgary: Be part of the energy.” The eastern tour is part of that.

For Lee Richardson, a Tory MP from Calgary and longtime political operator, Mr. Nenshi and his eastern sales pitch is reminiscent of another Alberta politician during the boom in the mid- to late-70s.

“We’ve been here before,” says Mr. Richardson. “This is what Peter Lougheed did during the first real boom here. I can remember travelling with Peter on a fairly regular basis to Toronto to talk to people and speak to the economic clubs . . .”

Mr. Richardson sees similarities between the mayor and the former Progressive Conservative premier. Not only is he just as energetic but he is “outward looking,” trying to picture and position the city for 20 years down the road.

Mr. Nenshi says that coming out of the global recession, Calgary didn’t have much of a bust. But city planners learned a lesson during the boom from 2005 to 2008, when businesses had trouble hiring and retaining workers and many people moving to Calgary had trouble finding housing.

This new campaign is aimed at trying to move to a steadier growth path, he says. It is estimated that there will be two million more people in the region over the next 50 or 60 years.

“It would be better if they didn’t all come at once,” he says.

Despite the fact that the Prime Minister is from Calgary and that Alberta is owned by the Harper Conservatives, Mr. Nenshi says the federal government has been “cautiously welcoming” to him since his election last year.

There is some political tension between the two levels of government.

He think it’s great that Stephen Harper is one of his constituents – in fact, the first time he met the Prime Minister he told him his neighbourhood was about to get a new LRT stop. That aside, he believes Mr. Harper is only slowly coming around to the realization that the federal government needs to play a bigger role in cities.

Mr. Nenshi acknowledges the promise made by the Tories during the election to set up a process with all cities to determine a long-term role in funding infrastructure. He calls this “a very big deal,” as was making the gas-tax transfer permanent.

But more needs to be done – such as extending the stimulus infrastructure spending.

“I can take anything they can throw at me and I promise we will put it to good use,” he says. “We actually spent the stimulus spending really well . . . it wasn’t just dubious infrastructure projects.”

He says his city has $2-billion in infrastructure needs.

As for his foray east, Mr. Nenshi is not trying to supplant Toronto as the centre of the universe – although it’s hard not to observe that Toronto Mayor Rob Ford is struggling with deep cuts while Mr. Nenshi is promoting a flush city full of jobs.

“While a little bit of healthy competition among cities is a good thing, we also have to recognize that having great global cities in Canada is good for all of us,” he says, adding that it’s time for the federal government to recognize this, too.

“In a new global economy we have to have tremendously successful global cities because it’s the cities that attract the talent from around the world that we really need,” says the mayor.

[plhought]

Go to the Alberta Auto Trader website. Go to the search function and type in Ford F-350, used. The higher the number of postings, the slower the oil patch is.

Brilliant, and true.

[Shiny Side Up]

What's the busiest time of the year for the oilpatch? Does the season have a significant impact on hiring for Alberta air operators?

The oil patch winds up when the ground freezes. That being said, Alberta unfortuntely doesn't have as large of a need for air operators since everything here moves by road, especially for the oil patch. Its not a particularly aviation friendly province.

[l'aviature]

A slight thread hijack, since we are on the subject of Alberta and the oil patch flying;;;

I'm thinking of relocating back Calgary and wonder who are the better outfits to fly for? Schedule, salary, company culture, maintenance etc.. are all the things I will look at.

I have lots of time in twin turbines, vfr/ifr, mountains etc...

PM details if you prefer.

Thanks in advance, l'aviature

[whiteguy]

What's the busiest time of the year for the oilpatch? Does the season have a significant impact on hiring for Alberta air operators?

The oil patch winds up when the ground freezes. That being said, Alberta unfortuntely doesn't have as large of a need for air operators since everything here moves by road, especially for the oil patch. Its not a particularly aviation friendly province.

Are you kidding????

Tell that to Canadian North, North Cariboo, Sunwest, Shell, Suncor........and many others!

Cariboo just added it 6th Dash 8 (3rd 300) and is bringing 146s on line this winter. All oil patch work!

The only unfriendly part is contrail requirements but if you have the time there are opportunities.

[Switchfoot]

That being said, Alberta unfortuntely doesn't have as large of a need for air operators since everything here moves by road, especially for the oil patch. Its not a particularly aviation friendly province.

Going to have to disagree with you on this point. There are several YYC and YEG based operators whose main business is oil related clients/customers. Not only that but a few airlines have direct flights to "the patch" from all over the country. Alberta has a VERY healthy aviation sector.


Switchfoot.

[Shiny Side Up]

I guess I should clarify then. Proportionate to its size, population and the ammount of business that goes on here Alberta doesn't have as much aviation business. While yes there are the larger operators out of YYC and YEG the rest of the province doesn't have a lot of aviation going on in it - again by comparrison. Notably missing in Alberta are the smaller range operators since there's not much advantage moving stuff by small planes when it can go by truck.

[privateer]

What's the busiest time of the year for the oilpatch? Does the season have a significant impact on hiring for Alberta air operators?

The oil patch winds up when the ground freezes. That being said, Alberta unfortuntely doesn't have as large of a need for air operators since everything here moves by road, especially for the oil patch. Its not a particularly aviation friendly province.

Were you born yesterday, or are you retarded?

[Shiny Side Up]

Read more carefully and then think again about your question.

edit: Many assume that the "oil patch" in Alberta is synnonomous with the Tar sands. Indeed there's a lot of traffic surrounding it, it probably accounts for a majority of the aviation work that happens in Alberta. As you commented above, there really is no seasonal change when it comes to affecting aviation. Whether its boom or bust certainly does. Having worked for both Petro Canada (back in the day) and later on Husky, I can tell one that from that side of things that we avoided like the plague moving anything by air if one could help it - this was in contrast to the other areas of operation, the Territories, BC and Saskatchewan where it was more of a necessity.

These days the wife works for Shell and its interesting that flying wise they usually send personell by AC. Shell's corporate aircraft doesn't move around any of the peons. Again often to sites in Alberta if they can get away with driving they go by truck. One should also note that due to the requirements of most of the big oil companies in the province there's nothing moving in service of it really smaller than a king air. Aside from the few photo survey occasionally emplyed by the patch (more indirectly) you won't find lots of the smaller operations running caravans, navajos and similarly sized stuff that you would if the same size of work was happening in say Ontario or BC.

Probably most revealing was relatively how little medevac is used by the "patch" in this province given its scope. There are a lot of poor souls who get a long ride in an ambulance rather than incur the cost of a flight - if the company can help it.

[Fresh Prince of King Air]

There are two different kinds of flying in Alberta and North Eastern B.C. (You could even include southern Sask as part of the "oil patch")

1.Flying in support of large "oil sands" operations. Like surface mining and SAGD projects that are large multi-billion dollar projects. These include Horizon, Firebag, Kearl, Mildred Lake etc. The flying for these projects is not seasonal and is very dependent on what phase of construction or operation they are in and fluctuates accordingly.

2.The flying that is in support of the more conventional (I use conventional lightly with the advent of Shale Gas) type "oil patch" work that requires some kind of drilling operation. This type of work is usually seasonal dependent because they require the use of roads to transport the rigs which tend to get too soft to drive on during the spring and fall months. Helicopters usually pick up during these periods however.

This usually means that the fixed wing operators that fly in support of both operations see a slight drop in spring and fall and a bit of a drop beginning around Stampede and ending in August when all the office workers take summer vacation. Either than that it's pretty steady year round. Especially this year, I think this is the busiest I have ever seen the industry and it doesn't appear to be slowing down.

Because all of the corporate head offices are in Calgary most of the flying originates from there. There is still however a healthy amount originating from Edmonton due to all the drilling companies being located in Nisku.

Hope that helps.

[privateer]

Shiny Side Up you need to look outside of shell. A few years ago they didn't even have a flight department. Now they have Dornier's and the EMB170. Not mention all the flying that NCA does for them.

I would say that the aviation industry is the strongest and most profitable here in Alberta than in the whole country. It's a bold claim but I would like you to show me proof otherwise

[Shiny Side Up]

I would say that the aviation industry is the strongest and most profitable here in Alberta than in the whole country. It's a bold claim but I would like you to show me proof otherwise

Hence why I ask you to read closer. I'm not saying that its not strong, nor am I saying its not profitable. All I'm saying is that by comparrison to the rest of Canada there's not as much activity as one would expect given the ammount of money and business involved, the primary reason being that unlike the rest of the provinces Alberta has a considerably more extensive road infrastructure. For example when I used to work for Petro Canada back in the day, their projects in Newfoundland (Hibernia at the time) dollar for dollar made use of roughly ten times the ammount of "aviation resources" than their ones in Alberta. I used Shell merely as an example - but you must concede that despite the fact that yes a lot of flights originate say from Calgary in support of their projects - its not projects in Alberta itself that require the use of "aviation assets" so its not the Alberta "oil patch" that's generating the necessity for aviation, its the ones that are happening in BC and Saskatchewan.

If one also looks at the broader picture and includes oil and gas work in the entirity of Alberta (I know its hard to believe but there is still a lot of drilling and work going on outside of Fort Mac) There is comparitively little aviation that goes on in support of it, aside from helicopters flying seismic and the odd pipeline patrol. For the money and business involved (comparitive to the Tar sands work) there's a lot of airstrips across the province which have very little activity, considering the ammount of wells and work that surround them.

[privateer]

I would say that the aviation industry is the strongest and most profitable here in Alberta than in the whole country. It's a bold claim but I would like you to show me proof otherwise

Hence why I ask you to read closer. I'm not saying that its not strong, nor am I saying its not profitable. All I'm saying is that by comparrison to the rest of Canada there's not as much activity as one would expect given the ammount of money and business involved, the primary reason being that unlike the rest of the provinces Alberta has a considerably more extensive road infrastructure. For example when I used to work for Petro Canada back in the day, their projects in Newfoundland (Hibernia at the time) dollar for dollar made use of roughly ten times the ammount of "aviation resources" than their ones in Alberta. I used Shell merely as an example - but you must concede that despite the fact that yes a lot of flights originate say from Calgary in support of their projects - its not projects in Alberta itself that require the use of "aviation assets" so its not the Alberta "oil patch" that's generating the necessity for aviation, its the ones that are happening in BC and Saskatchewan.

If one also looks at the broader picture and includes oil and gas work in the entirity of Alberta (I know its hard to believe but there is still a lot of drilling and work going on outside of Fort Mac) There is comparitively little aviation that goes on in support of it, aside from helicopters flying seismic and the odd pipeline patrol. For the money and business involved (comparitive to the Tar sands work) there's a lot of airstrips across the province which have very little activity, considering the ammount of wells and work that surround them.

I really don't understand what you are getting at. If you want to tally up the exact number of flights that are oil patch related in western Canada I think you find the number staggering. I will admit that there are less King Air type flights than there use to be, but that is mainly due to bigger aircraft taking on the job because the projects are expanding beyond the King Air requirement. If you look at the amount of flights coming back and forth from the Christina Basin, Fort MacMurray, Bonnyville, Ft Nelson, and Rainbow Lake areas to name just a few it is a lot! Just look at Flightaware.

[Shiny Side Up]

Not talking about all of Western Canada, we're talking about Alberta. While yes there are lots of flights going to and from those places, the point is given the significance of the industry, one wonders why there aren't more? These also aren't the only places with significant Oil and Gas operations going on in the province either. One would almost expect non-stop air traffic across the province and every little airstrip a hive of activity. You might need to take a bit of a trip outside your usual routes to see what I mean, so I'll leave it at that. Here's something to think about in the meantime. Why would an area that uses so much aviation as you say, be looking at closing a valuable asset to oil work like the Edmonton Muni airport? Why is a busy Oil related hub like YYC so busy trying to eliminate as much non commercial carrier traffic as it can to be shifted to the less convinient YBW? Why aren't there more busy airports around Calgary to serve this need?

[privateer]

While an airport such as YXD is dying a slow death there have been numerous new aerodromes that have sprung up in Alberta. Some were already there and have been vastly improved with longer runways and better IFR approaches. The situation in Calgary is that they are not trying to push out non commercial aviation but merely trying to control traffic so that it is safe. They have waited till the eleventh hour to build that parallel runway and it may seem at times that they don't want us in YYC but nothing could be further from the truth. Once the capacity is there they will gladly take us.

The original plan to build the parallel runway was back in 1975, but was scrapped for whatever reason.

As for my usual routes, I currently fly to or have flown to every oil patch related strip in Alberta. In my opinion, some are adequately used and some are stupid busy.

[Shiny Side Up]

As for my usual routes, I currently fly to or have flown to every oil patch related strip in Alberta. In my opinion, some are adequately used and some are stupid busy.

I hate to tell you this but every strip in Alberta is oil patch related, so you should be asking yourself why you aren't flying to more strips?

The situation in Calgary is that they are not trying to push out non commercial aviation but merely trying to control traffic so that it is safe. They have waited till the eleventh hour to build that parallel runway and it may seem at times that they don't want us in YYC but nothing could be further from the truth.

They've done a really good job of pushing a lot of commercial aviation out, regardless of what reasons you choose to believe that they've done it for. Do you really think that the parallel runway is there to help the aviation in the oil and gas sector? Since O&G is the big money in the province, one must wonder why they did wait so long if said traffic warrants it. Don't you think they would have moved a little quicker on expanding YYC if the big oil companies pushed for it because they want it?

[slowstream]

I hate to tell you this but every strip in Alberta is oil patch related, so you should be asking yourself why you aren't flying to more strips?

They've done a really good job of pushing a lot of commercial aviation out, regardless of what reasons you choose to believe that they've done it for. Do you really think that the parallel runway is there to help the aviation in the oil and gas sector? Since O&G is the big money in the province, one must wonder why they did wait so long if said traffic warrants it. Don't you think they would have moved a little quicker on expanding YYC if the big oil companies pushed for it because they want it?

HOLY PETE!!!

WTF are you trying to do? Split the Atom again, its been done get over it.

Every sector and every Provence has its own unique industry and dare I say it culture; B.C is not Alberta, Alberta is not Saskatchewan although close, and Ontario and Quebec are different as is the maritime province's. YXD and the parallel runway in YYC are all political, with poor timing, poor lobbying and poor P.R.

The bottom line is that there is loads of flying in Alberta, sched and charter and albeit a great deal of the charter work in Alberta is either oil or mining related there is also a great deal of corporate charter work which I personally did for a number of years. There are also many considerable flying out of other place's in Alberta as well, YXH, YQL, YQF, YMM, YQU.

[whiteguy]

Was number 8 in line to take off in YYC yesterday, 3 Cariboo DH8, Suncor RJ, Shell EMB, Sunwest 1900 & Dash and 1 AC A320. Behind us were Cariboo Citation and a 200, Hawk Air Dash 8 and WJ.

Yeah, not much going on in Alberta for Oil and Gas flying!

[Shiny Side Up]

As usual, reading comprehension is at an all time low here on Avcanada. Not much point I suppose to getting an idea across to some people here. Someone might note that the opening poster was asking how flying business in Alberta relates to the seasonal nature of the oil patch in Alberta, but no one reads entire posts here before hitting the "reply" button.

YES There is a lot of aviation activity in Alberta.

NO The seasonal nature of the oil patch in Alberta does not have much effect on how busy aviation relating to it is.

[Johnny#5]