Daniel Ortuño pulled a small piece of Texas history from a shelf in a building at the University of Texas at Austin. The yellowing piece of paper said that on Dec. 19, 1951, John L. Boyd began drilling a 1,350-foot-deep oil well through 17 layers of shale and limestone in Crockett County in southwest Texas.
As drillers, we use many chemical compounds on a daily basis. Drilling mud, acids and surfactants are all items utilized in the drilling industry. Many of these chemicals can be potentially hazardous to our health.
Nearly three years later, you have to know what to look for. It takes a hard look at the flood plains over the banks of the Kalamazoo River to see the effects of an incident that covered the southwest Michigan area with oil.