You Sure About That, Pardnor?

Its hard, damn labor under some incredibly difficult circumstances. You hurt everywhere, stay exhausted on a job, can't hear when people talk to you afterward and your eyes burn constantly from all the fluids blowing in your face. You work from can't see to can't see in places you never even heard of before. The romance of people wanting autographs, or asking you questions, or whispering behind your back; the newspaper and television interviews, people wanting to buy you drinks all the time in bars... it all gets real old, real fast. When you leave home you seldom know how long you will be gone and what to tell the family. Its hurry up and get here, we don't give a rats ass how you get home; in on a jet, out on a chicken bus.

And don't kid yourself; everybody gets scared now and then. You can't show it but there are lots of days you get back to the hotel room, or the camp and you lay on the bed and wonder what in the hell did you do that day and how in the hell is it you are still alive. It makes you want to go get drunk.

“It's hard, dangerous work and a man has to be damn tough to do it. He has to be smart, about a lot of different things…and it helps to have big nuts.” Coots Matthews

Closing credits to the presentation, The History of Oil Well Firefighting and Blowout Control.