On a construction site along the Trans-Alaska Pipeline, a woman in her early 20s operates an open-cab machine in frostbite conditions.
She’s stationed in the North Slope area of the state, where only a surface layer of the 95,000 square miles of tundra thaws each season. Temperatures range from 5 to 55°F in summer and −5 to −20°F in winter.
No matter the weather, this laborer won’t leave her post, not even to take a few weeks off to thaw her hands.
“She said, ‘I trained for this, and this is what I want to do,’ ” recounts Bryan Abel, director of the National Pipeline Training Fund. “She is still working North Slope to this day.”
Last year, the North Slope site had a shortage of skilled operators. They had interested operators, but not enough with pipeline experience. The International Union of Operating Engineers (IUOE) stepped in to offer a pair of three-week training sessions for North Slope through their national pipeline training fund, an industry-led fund used to prepare workers for construction.
Two crews of 10, including the young female operator, were flown from North Slope to the IUOE’s facility in Crosby, Texas, where they underwent pipeline training, so they could fill crew shortages.
Every year, about 450 to 600 people attend training at Crosby’s International Training and Education Center. The opportunity is available to trade workers who would like to upgrade their skills to pursue careers in the pipeline industry.
The IUOE’s International Training and Education Center in Crosby, TX sees about 450 to 600 people attend training sessions each year.
Training is free for eligible union members in good standing in the United States and Canada; transportation, room, board and tuition are covered by the National Pipeline Training Fund. Most programs run from between one to three weeks; the students attend learning sessions six days a week, 10 hours a day.
“When it comes to heavy equipment used in the pipeline industry, we train on almost every piece of it,” Abel explains. “Work (on a pipeline) is different. The environmental regulations are much more strict. Safety is the number one priority. We go through all the processes of what these operators can expect when they work on a pipeline job.”
What is notable about the Crosby facility is that its training site is set up to resemble a real pipeline environment.
“If anybody ever comes to visit the site during our advanced training classes, they could not tell it from a real job,” Abel says. “We have built a half a mile of pipeline.”
To help create this realistic training environment, Enbridge has donated around 5,000 feet of pipe since 2018. Most recently, we donated five segments of pipe to the center while Michels, a primary contractor of Enbridge, helped secure a donated a welding shack from CRC-Evans to be utilized in sideboom training.
“Enbridge is proud to partner with Bryan and the IUOE Training Center,” says John Peacock, a Houston-based core programs construction manager with Enbridge, whose team sourced and helped load the most recent pipe donation when IUOE representatives picked it up. “As the pipeline construction industry continues to evolve, it’s important that we have a trained workforce to support the safe construction of future projects.”
