Life on the Gulf - Dirk Ellerbe

Dirk Ellerbe, an offshore manager on the Veolia ES Swordfish, spends his days and nights managing operations and job progress aboard the vessel.

For Dirk Ellerbe, offshore manager with Veolia ES Industrial Services – Marine Services division, life at sea begins every day at 0530 hours. Stationed on the Veolia ES Swordfish, a world-class, multi-support vessel in the Gulf of Mexico, Dirk is responsible for managing all the day-to-day operations aboard the world-class Swordfish, as well as keeping on-shore contacts, commonly referred to as “the beach,” up to speed on the crew, the job and the ship.

Compared to the jobs of many Veolia ES Industrial Services employees, Dirk’s work environment and schedule is more nontraditional. He works a rotating “30-days-on, 30-days-off” schedule, which means for 30 days, he works aboard the Swordfish, monitoring the crew and tracking job progress. But when his 30-day rotation is up, Dirk heads back to shore for 30 days of off-time, and the ship’s other offshore manager, Tony Ott, comes aboard. “One thing many people may not realize is that when we’re working offshore, we don’t come back to land until our rotation is complete. So for 30 days at a time, I live full-time on the vessel, away from my family and friends back home,” says Dirk.

Aboard the Swordfish

There are currently approximately 85 employees aboard the Swordfish, and interestingly, all are there to support the one saturation diver working underwater at any given time! The crew, working for a division of Chevron called the Hurricane Restoration Team (HRT), works in 12-hour blocks – 12 a.m. to 12 p.m. and 12 p.m. to 12 a.m. This means that Dirk is on-call nearly around the clock to manage the crew shifts. “I hold a preshift safety meeting before each shift begins. Safety is a critical issue for us, and we have health and safety representatives from both Veolia and Chevron aboard the ship to ensure we follow all appropriate protocol,” says Dirk.

Because there are so many individuals and operations to monitor, Dirk’s day-to-day activities are tightly scheduled to allow him to complete all the necessary tasks.

Days begin at 05:30 hours with a morning report from dive control. In the office by 0600 hours, Dirk spends the mornings catching up on paperwork and emails, visiting the back-deck to monitor work activities, updating ship supervisors and handling human resources and other administrative issues.

Every morning at 1000 hours, Dirk holds a meeting with the Chevron and Veolia representatives, the ship captain, supervisors and other key personnel regarding the issues of the day. First and foremost on the meeting agenda is the weather. “Weather is the most critical issue for us on a day-to-day basis because it dictates how much progress we’ll be able to make that day,” says Dirk. “Other agenda items are transportation and supplies, project and safety updates and any housekeeping issues.”

After the morning meeting, Dirk checks on the back-deck’s progress, holds the day-shift safety meeting, enjoys lunch, handles more office and administrative issues, and coordinates a project update with the beach. Evenings are usually spent making personal phone calls, working out, watching television on one of the ship’s eight satellite channels and preparing for the next day. But before bed time, Dirk holds the night-shift safety meeting at 2330 hours. Next is a few hours of shuteye, usually interrupted with a middle-of-thenight phone call, and then Dirk begins the routine again the next morning at 0530 hours.

About the Chevron Project

The Chevron project, which began on the Veolia ES Kingfisher during the early summer of 2007, involves the use of a saturation diving team to clean up oil-rig platforms in the Gulf of Mexico damaged during Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. The majority of the platforms, after decontaminated of all hydrocarbons, will be left in the water as “reef-in-place” structures to support the oceanic eco-system. Saturation diving is a diving technique that allows divers to work tethered from a vessel at great depths for extended periods of time. Saturation divers live and work in pressurized chambers for days, even weeks, before going through decompression, which can take as long as 6-8 days, depending on how deep the driver has been working.

Dirk and the rest of the Swordfish crew are just one player in the comprehensive clean-up of the Gulf of Mexico in a post-Katrina and Rita world, but they play an important role in the rebuilding. “We are one of the last crews to visit each damaged platform in the Gulf. It’s our job to make sure that things are all tied up, and our goal is to leave the sea floor in as good a condition as it was the day the platform was installed in the water,” says Dirk.