eSea 31 - Thinking Big by Maersk Training

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EM AGA ZINE FROM M A ERSK TR A INING

M A R I T I M E /O I L & G A S/ W I N D/C R A N E · N O.31/2018

Thinking Big

Rachel’s Screen Tests > eSea Rider > Totally Immersed > Two Questions – One Answer > Home on the Rig > Deep In The Heart Of Texas > The A to Y of Texan History >

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4 Rachel’s Screen Tests Rachel had the idea for a system of monitoring incidents onboard rigs a long while back. Covering entire walls in white boards and flip charts to plot the progress of a situation, she thought, ‘there must be a better way than this.’ > Robert Ziegler, Weatherford International Evelyn Baldwin, Maersk Training Inc.

Leveraging CLD Potentials: Optimizing Economics Through Dynamic Well Control

eSea Rider

Totally Immersed

Motorbikes have been a long-time passion of Kim and when he moved from Denmark to Texas, the road to opportunity also opened. >

For the major part of his adult life David Lobdell has trained. As a US naval aviator almost every working action was practiced over and over again with the aim that should the need arise, clear communication, sound judgement and muscle memory would result in the number one desired conclusion. >

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14 Two Questions – One Answer There are jobs where you spend your life preparing for what you hope will never happen. >

16 Home on the Rig

Deep In The Heart Of Texas

It’s in his blood and even after a quarter of a century as an oilman he still yearns for the open space of a cattle ranch. >

Here’s a quiet place where the Olsen’s lie with the Jensen’s, the Hansen’s beside the Petersen’s, the Nielsen’s just in front of the Andersen’s >

24 The A to Y of Texan History There is a strong likelihood that there’s a connection between the seven-pointed Maersk star and the Texas state’s flag – they both could have Danish origins. >

it's no ugly duckling We’ve almost done it once before, focused an entire eSea on a single location. A while back, in eSea20, much of the content was generated by a visit to Aberdeen, the oil capital of the North Sea. This time this whole issue revolves around Houston, the oil capital of the Gulf of Mexico, and beyond. The stories are not exclusively about oil production, there’s a breath of fresh wind, the thing to do in a tornado and a couple of historical tales connecting Texas to Denmark. The Maersk Training in Houston story is an interesting one. Having just entered its third year, it was established as the rollercoaster of oil prices took its second big dip in the 21st Century. There was a global shudder through the industry with cutbacks in production, staff and training, though probably not in that order. Establishing a multi-million dollar training centre in 2015 could have been akin to opening a holiday camp in Afghanistan. It wasn’t.

Training has always been the Ugly Duckling of industry, the first cost to be shown the door in hard times. But those who saw beyond the door realized that when the turnaround happened, the first uncertain steps taken by the oil companies would be to hire the drilling companies with the best safety and performance track record. These were largely the companies that welcomed the Houston centre and they were first through the door. In partnership both parties already see the rewards. The duckling has turned into a swan. One major that embraced training saw a 16 to 40% improvement in safety and performance. Another, recognizing short comings in their crew’s skill levels, ordered a subject specific follow-up course and in the first week back at work they encountered a situation that they had just practiced. The single correct action that the driller took paid for the entire course programme, and more. Here we hear their tales.

There are 15 places in the United States called Denmark, some of which have no connection whatsoever with the country, they just liked the name. However there is one very Danish place called Danevang, which in itself is a word for the country, but one that is touched by a considerable degree of nostalgia. We visit it, searching for a hint of what it was like to set up a new industry in a new land and seeing what remains of the dreams of the settlers a 120 years on. eSea32 will follow hard on the heals of this special when we reflect a more global Maersk Training and a broader look at the industries it supports, maritime, wind, as well as oil & gas. In the meantime we hope you enjoy this insight into Houston.

Richard Lightbody rli039@maersktraining.com

Invention puts a crisis into manageable focus

Rachelâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Screen Tests 4

Rachel Booker’s moment of invention is a bit like the evolution of the dishwasher – like Josephine Cochrane 130 years before her, she saw the need and the possibilities of using established technology to create something new. Hopefully Rachel won’t have to wait as long as Josephine to have her invention fully utilized.

osephine Cochrane introduced the dishwasher at the 1886 Chicago Fair. She’d invented it to cope with a domestic issue, servants breaking valuable crockery but she only developed it to cover debits created by her spendthrift late husband. However it took until the 1950’s for it to get into the domestic kitchen and a further forty years to lose the ‘luxury’ label. Rachel’s RESCUE™ program is a year old and already there are signs of it developing into something special. Rachel had the idea for a system of monitoring incidents onboard

rigs a long while back. Covering entire walls in white boards and flip charts to plot the progress of a situation, she thought, ‘there must be a better way than this.’

that bring together numerous action areas on a rig, they are fired up and an operator responds to given information. It enables the OIM or whosoever is in charge to see clearly what is going on and then make equally clear decisions. It is decision-making in 3D.

When she moved to Maersk Training she noticed a huge touchscreen and the thought struck home. A request for some software started the whole process. ‘It was just a thought and it is pretty cool just to see that thought come into fruition here. It’s come a long way in a pretty short time. It’s been helped by great feedback,’ she observes. Her invention is now one year old and being used daily in Houston with interest from other centres.

Apart from those at the centre BP and Seadrill have seen the value of the system and literally taken it onboard. One rig now uses it and a second, West Capricorn is about to install it. When we visited Rachel there was an ISE course and the crew of West Capricorn were engaged using RESCUE™. Rachel gave a demonstration, racing through the options with the dexterity of a Las Vegas croupier. Scenarios came to accurate life, but already she says the uses have expanded with one rig using it for the permissions system and onboard training as well as emergency management.

TOTAL OVERVIEW What RESCUE™ does is to allow a concise and accurate overview of any situation through using a touchscreen that reacts to the information fed into it. Today the two huge screens at Maersk Training in Houston are parked where they are most effective, in the emergency response areas. During immersive courses, those

A LOVABLE BIG BROTHER In the future she can see some, maybe nearly all, of the

operator’s movements being done automatically. For instance instead of physically moving the smoke icon, the image would be triggered by the detector itself and fire and medic crews would have tags on that showed their movement. Indeed in the future the board could multiply and be on each deck with everyone’s movements tracked by an armband. Gone would be the days when you ask if anyone seen somebody. You could just type in their name and the screen would show you exactly where they are. It is Big Brother at a useful and acceptable level. Josephine Cochrane never lived to see her luxury turn into near necessity, but she did see her inventiveness change the lives of millions. She founded a company that today still makes the Rolls Royce of kitchen aids, in fact that is the name that Josephine’s firm evolved into, Kitchen Aid. Perhaps Rachel’s invention should be called Rescue Aid.

eSea Rider

Racer or driller, Kim sees training as the only safe route

“The rule is that there is nowhere on a racetrack where you glide along, you either have gas on or brake on. There’s nothing in between.“

Kim in action at COTA 6

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In a just a couple of weeks Lewis Hamilton would be facing the very same corner, hitting it at the highest and safest speed he can get out of his F1 Mercedes. He will do it perfectly because of talent and days of practice. Astride a Ducati superbike and kissing 160 mph Kim Laursen, a little bit more vulnerable on two wheels, could fully appreciate the advantages of practice and being trained.

otorbikes have been a longtime passion of Kim and when he moved from Denmark to Texas, the road to opportunity also opened. Those long telegraphpoled lined stretches of tarmac heading into the horizon, just yearn for a Harley to roar and bubble along them. But Kim, who’s wife has the Harley, was more drawn towards a 3.4 mile stretch of tarmac just two hours from his home, COTA, the Circuit of The Americas in the State capital Austin. Home of the American F1 Grand Prix, for a fistful of dollars you can push your bike and yourself to the limits. What Kim, who’d been training drillers back home in Svendborg and now in Houston, found out was that learning how

to do something the right way, really does pay dividends. He joined a Ducati club and one of the members was, like Kim’s bike, and ex-racer and he introduced him to ‘something called trail braking’.

‘What he could see was that I let go of the brake when hitting the corner, but the physics is to hold on to the brake because the downward pressure compresses the wheel, expands the breadth of the tire giving you more contact, more grip. It means in fact that it is dangerous to go into a corner too slowly. As soon as you hit the apex you need to throttle.’

TAKING LESSONS ‘I took a riding safety class. They put cameras on your bike and video everything. For me training is very interesting and effective for how they do it and we draw parallels from how we do it. It is very similar to what we do in Maersk Training, in that it is hand’s on.’

‘I’m the student and I’m told something that doesn’t seem right is right. Then you go out and do it and it is right and you get to understand that. If you want to draw a parallel to the simulators where you break habits and do something you never thought was right but find out that it is. The difference is that on the simulators you can reboot any

With cameras onboard Kim would go out and do his best, then the instructor would look at the video and make adjustment suggestions to his riding style.

errors, any errors on the bike are sore.’ ‘The rule is that there is nowhere on a racetrack where you glide along, you either have gas on or brake on. There’s nothing in between.’ You don’t have to be a weekend racer to draw a line between training and travelling safely along a track or even a road. A fair proportion of us have gone through some training, a mixture of theory and practical before gaining a driver’s license. Rather like on an Enhanced Well Control course, the practice of practicing the unlikely could well be the most important lesson of your life. It is a parallel that Americans should have the best

A piece of art? No its the frame for Kimâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s latest re-build

understanding of. In 2016 there were 323 million living in the States and in that same year the statistics show that there were 269 million registered vehicles and 222 million drivers.* GO-LISA The bike that Kim has for his track-days is no stranger to racing. A 190 hp Ducati 1098r it was used in 2008 in Superbike and although there have been modifications over the past ten years, she still can outperform todayâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s bikes on the straight, something to do with the torque he said. Back in his garage Kim has three other bikes in various stages of development. It is a passion he shares with wife Lisa, who thankfully, has a racing pedigree and although it is a scary business, understands. She used to do go-karting, not the indoor one-hour-of-fun variety, but serious karting. She team raced with and against Jan Magnussen, Ralf Schumacher and F1 legend

Giancarlo Fisichella. However, Lisa doesn’t zoom around COTA, she’s currently living the American Harley dream.

managed to shut in a kick with just three barrels. It was a single action which paid for the training course over and over.

Parking the bike conversation for a second Kim returned to the connection between racing training and the job that pays for it. He cited a recent incident where some drillers had been called back because they’d underperformed during the ISE course. The objective was for them to be able to detect and feel what a kick is like and then have the confidence to take the appropriate action without worrying about consequences like ‘am I going to get fired for doing this?’

‘For me that translates directly to you do when you hit that corner. What we did for that driller was to give him the confidence to get out of the corner, safely and efficiently. It gave him the authority to do it and he has that and the responsibility. Half the crew is sleeping comfortably in the knowledge that the guy at the controls will get them round every corner.’

It should be muscle memory and that is what they managed to achieve with the extra Enhanced Well Control class. Kim knows that because within two weeks, simulation turned to reality for one of the drillers and he

*the figure is from the Statistic Portal and the seemingly strange discrepancy in there being more vehicles than drivers may be down to the huge number of commercial trucks

'With a motor bike you get closer to the front door'

Totally Immersed Not a pilot course, or a course for pilots, but one former pilot sees it as piloting the future

or the past two years he’s been deeply involved in immersing another profession, getting them to adopt and adapt to the relatively simple concept that he says, in the past, has saved his life. He explains by quoting a part of his warm-up introduction to those new to Crew Resource Management, connecting their roles to those of a fighter pilot. ‘How many of you guys operate multi-million dollar equipment, how many of you guys make decisions that can kill people?

“Everybody here is somebody’s son, daughter, father, mother, grandparent – we have a responsibility and an obligation to bring them home safely.“

The only thing that separates you from a pilot is the sunglasses and the leather jacket and I bet even there, some of you have both.’ ‘They are in the exact same position, they need the same skills the same level of attention, they need the same resources to be able to operate efficiently and bring everybody home safe at the end of the day. That’s what

Totally Immersed

CRM Evangelist David Lobdell in what he calls the Taj Mahal 11

Totally Immersed

“The beauty of it here at the Maersk Training facilities is that they are going to have challenges. They are going to be forced to handle these tough situations.“

it is all about, everybody here is somebody’s son, daughter, father, mother, grandparent – we have a responsibility and an obligation to bring them home safely.’ WHERE NEGATIVE BECOMES POSITIVE David’s new role and title is a little longer than his naval rank of captain; BP Upstream Talent and Learning GWO Competence

Manager, barely squeezes on to his card. A CRM ‘evangelist’ he extracts every benefit from the process. In particular he likes the usage of feedback, in the way Maersk Training has responded and ever improved the courses and the observations from the instructors regarding competences. Negative feedback is only bad if you ignore it. David sees what input they get as an opportunity for change and improvement.

leaders get to see how they are in a crisis, you see how they lead people, you see how they behave,’ says David. The upshot is that BP, according to David, sees the value which directly translates from rig action to board room reports. ’Although

“They have been finishing the wells early and delivering cost savings on their budgets. They are also delivering projects ahead of schedule so they can start production earlier.“

‘Baseline competence as it is evaluated in many situations – derive from standard yearly performance appraisals. The problem is that you don’t get to see or observe folks to see how they react or handle extremely difficult and challenging situations, as most personnel will, hopefully, never find themselves in those situations. The beauty of it here at the Maersk Training facilities is that they are going to have challenges. They are going to be forced to handle these tough situations and the instructors and 12

we cannot draw causation to the training we receive from Maersk, we have seen a correlation with improved rig performance. They have been finishing the wells early and delivering cost savings on their budgets. They are also delivering projects ahead of schedule so they can start production earlier. It all that adds up to tremendous value to the company.’

THE TAJ MAHAL OF TRAINING One of the key aspects CRM is about learning to become a better communicator. The best way is to say exactly what you want in a concise way and then get confirmation that the message has been correctly interpreted by asking the recipient to explain back what they have to do. It is also about involving people in the decision-making process and including them in the right way. David cites the example of a shift in the dog house; if the action involves the driller, then move the

Totally Immersed

“This place is a Taj Mahal, absolutely, there is nowhere else like it anywhere else. So many drilling contractors have similar type of facilities where they have a couple of different simulators all tied together, but the excellence comes from knowing how to use the facilities.“

conversation over to the driller’s chair, thus avoiding disrupting his work and allowing him to contribute, and be in the picture.

knowing how to use the facilities. Drawing from my knowledge as a naval aviator, the US navy has been operating aircraft carriers for over a hundred years now, numerous other countries like China and Russia, they have aircraft carriers, what do they do with them? China has a beautiful aircraft carrier, it’s fantastic, but having the piece of kit doesn’t mean you know how to use it effectively, efficiently. So what Maersk does here is that they are able to use it and get the maximum value out of it. So this is a flagship and it is because it is used properly, it’s used effectively.’

David says he uses CRM at home ‘after all when it comes to deciding on a family vacation, it’s only right to have an open discussion, for all to have their wishes expresses.’ Also, safety is best practiced by leading by example. Nothing makes him more upset than seeing a parent and child out cycling with the only the child wearing a helmet – ‘what kind of role model are the parents?’ He picked up a travel reference when asked about the Houston centre he’s well used to visiting.

David was visiting the centre at an important point in the entire BP training programme. The latest cycle was seeing the return of crews for top-up training and he said he could see the enthusiasm, ‘buy-in’ to the whole concept because the crew knew the value of the training they were going to be getting.

‘This place is a Taj Mahal, absolutely, there is nowhere else like it anywhere else. So many drilling contractors have similar type of facilities where they have a couple of different simulators all tied together, but the excellence comes from 13

The CRM Week In View ‘You see them walking in on the Monday and they’re thinking, “I don’t know what I’m doing here, these are my days off, is it a well control class?” and then on Tuesday they go “hey hang on a second this isn’t well control” and they start incorporating what they are learning, by Wednesday they are saying “I need to practice CRM, I’m making mistakes, this isn’t good, tomorrow’s going to be a disaster.” By end of Thursday they go “I understand, I’m doing it, I’m using it.” By Friday everyone’s high fiving and saying this is a phenomenal course. The transition is really exciting.’ David Lobdell

Do you know how to use what’s in your toolbox? Do you have the right toolbox?

Two Questions – One Answer T

here are jobs where you spend your life preparing for what you hope will never happen. On the flight deck the captain and first officer have gone through a ridged check list since the alarms had starting ringing. Alarms now silenced and the aircraft in trouble they call air traffic control and declare for the first time in their company’s history, ‘Mayday’ In the control tower the traffic controller hears the Mayday call for the first time in her fifteenyear career yet systematically goes through the options open to the stricken plane. One is an emergency landing at a domestic airport five minutes’ flight time away. In the driller’s chair, Rob was into the seventh hour of his twelvehour shift. Surrounded by screens there’s a flashing message on one of them. It’s an increase in the return flowback. He

90%

decrease in risk of Blowouts on rigs with RCD

hasn’t seen this since a training exercise 20 months ago, hasn’t seen it for real in seven years, but muscle memory kicks in. He stops drilling, spaces out and knows he has to shut the well in immediately.

the same time, there are few addons. With the other, the driller too is confined to what tools he has in front of him, but these tools potentially could be expanded to offer very different options to how to handle the situation. That expansion is often held back by company preference and traditionalism.

These two incidents share a common bond. They are skilled humans with high technology at their fingertips, but susceptible to the frailties of mechanics and at the mercy of the force of nature. The difference is that with one, the aircraft, they are bound solidly within one set of procedures where the equipment is both specific and standard at

A paper written by Robert Ziegler of Weatherford International and Evelyn Baldwin of Maersk Training on Closed Loop Drilling was presented at a conference in Rio de Janeiro. It puts forward the case for adopting closed system drilling, methods which can 14

reduce the effects of a kick back by an estimated 90%. Through the paper they embrace change. It is not as if techniques like Managed Pressurized Drilling, MPD, are new, it is just that for a variety of reasons their adoption has been slow. UNIQUE ACCESS The duo had unique access to unpublished files which gave them the broadest of foundations on which to base their paper, Leveraging CLD Potentials: Optimizing Economics Through Dynamic Well Control. Some 5,000 wells over a five-year period were cataloged and what they found was that Closed Loop Drilling was one of the most underutilized performance tools on the market and that in the prevailing downturn in the industry, the rigs that were still operational were overwhelmingly those capable of the most efficient drilling techniques.

‘…. interestingly when the 2000 rig fleet shrank to just a few hundred in the current downturn, it was the most advanced super singles with top drives and higher levels of automation (and in 75% of the case, at least an RCD) that kept operating, while the few simple rigs were very quickly laid down and never used again.’ Through studying the 5,000 wells they established that a rig might only have to handle an actual influx once every three to four years. With four drillers on shifts this means that in a ten year career a driller might only expect to have to deal with one or two actual kicks, and quite possibly only one or never at all. ONE KICK A DECADE In the paper they note, ‘Because of prudent practices, well trained and aware crews are generally a more risk-averse culture than often prevalent in land operations, with wells often being drilled in the drilling window close to the formation

HYDROCARBONS ENTERING THE WELLBORE Escape beyond BOP undetected

20%

80%

Contained by BOP

control courses encourage a memorized response to standard situations. ‘Studies show that rote memorization of performance is generally good when the assessment is expected. However, when the event is unexpected and the crew is caught off guard, expected behaviours and actions are not performed with accuracy.’

Robert Ziegler, Weatherford International Evelyn Baldwin, Maersk Training Inc.

strength instead of pore pressure, often accepting frequent and substantial lost-circulation events. Thus, a well control event in which the BOP is closed to shut in the well occurs roughly every 18 to 24 rig months, depending on the well type and operating area. Because of the described practices and the often narrow drilling margins, a lot of false indications, such as ballooning and breathing, can lead to the BOP being closed. In a final analysis, only half of these well control events were caused by an actual influx. Therefore, a rig has to

handle an actual influx only every 3 to 4 years. An experienced driller who is on duty for a quarter of the rig time in 10 years, he may only experience one or two actual kicks.’

Leveraging CLD Potentials: Optimizing Economics Through Dynamic Well Control White paper

Constant training, as with the aerospace industry, along with having the best tools available, the authors argue is the best way to prepare for that once in a decade moment. Evelyn, quoting a study by Casper, Gerven and Williams in 2013, points out that traditional well 15

To gain access to the white paper, click on the picture.

It’s in his blood and even after a quarter of a century he still yearns for the open space of a cattle ranch. All those years back, sitting in the saddle, as his father, grandfather and forbearers had done, Johnny Leal made the decision to follow his own trail. A working cowboy could earn $300 a week back then, but that was small money compared to the expectations of an oilman. Like many of his mates, Johnny moved from range to rig.

Home on the Rig More Johnny Crane than Johnny Wayne

‘Sitting in the crane cab out there in the ocean, you get your own very different view of the openness of the world,’ he says. But he points out that there are similarities between working cattle and operating a crane. ‘There’s a big expanse around you, but all that really matters is what is immediately near you. Roping a steer is a close-up dangerous thing and so is navigating a load with six guys below you.’

Johnny rides the range in his ATV

Life has changed in both Johnny’s chosen careers. A cowboy today is more likely to jump into a helicopter or ATV than hop onto a horse and a crane driver sits in a cab closer to an airplane cockpit than a box full of heavy levers. The changes have breed a different type of cowboy and crane driver. ‘Today the crane is an extension of gaming, with consoles and fingertip control, but what I’m happy to pass on is what makes the crane work. The old operator with big heavy levels could feel and understand everything he was asking of his machine. With every shudder behind and in front of him he knew what was going on.’ COMPETENCE IS KING The danger he believes is in losing sight of what a simple flick of a joystick is actually doing to the tons of metal it controls. His passion today is in getting the message across to the new generation of operators. ‘I’ve always fought against the old belief that some people had in

the old days, that if you shared your knowledge you weakened your own job. There were those who kept secrets to themselves in order to keep their jobs. They were so wrong, you need to spread knowledge, as that is better for everyone.’ Training he sees is not about putting people through a box ticking programme and allowing them to come out the other end with a certificate. ‘It is all about competence, about totally understanding why we do things the way they are done. The way they ought to be done.’ In the past he’s had to live with people who he felt were not competent. People who got jobs because they were someone’s brother-in-law rather than appointed on ability to do that precise job. It riled him and it was that irritation that lead him into his role as an instructor. He talks with a deep passion and pride for his second occupation, but he’s never shaken the dust of the prairie of his jeans. Brought

up in a south Texan family who’d live off the range for several generation in an area where cattle are for eatin’ not showin’, he looks at his cowboy years and recognizes that times have changed there too.

Guess what we’re having for dinner

HORSEPOWER ‘But it’s a different world, they get about on helicopters and ATV’s,’ says Johnny who is the proud owner of one of the massive trucks that have made the horse, if not totally redundant, a secondary means of transport. In fact the huge pick-ups are a common passion for both cowboys and oilmen. The parking lot outside Maersk Training’s centre in Houston is crammed full of them on course days. Twenty-five years ago Johnny was on a horse seven days a week, breaking them in, training them. ‘Even today I practice roping whenever I can, I guess it is in the blood.’ Today, when working, he’s breaking in the next generation of crane operators.

Everything’s bigger in Texas

A tale of adaptation and learning from others in order to survive

Deep In The Heart Of Texas There’s a quiet place where the Olsen’s lie with the Jensen’s, the Hansen’s beside the Petersen’s, the Nielsen’s just in front of the Andersen’s. Their inseparability is a monument to courage, endeavor and sheer resilience. They toiled, loved and lived as a distinct community and are now together forever, eight thousand kilometers from their homeland, in a graveyard deep in the heart of Texas.

hat brought them to a huge slice of unfarmed prairie was the twin harshness of a what they’d briefly endured through a new life in the coldness of Iowa, which itself had been triggered by an unforgiving existence in the

place they had to leave, but would forever call home, Denmark. Some of the 94 families drawn to buy virgin land and a new life at $9 an acre, came directly from farmsteads in Jutland and the Danish islands. Between them

they bought hundreds of acres, unseen, from a land salesman. Back in 1895 Texas was remote but full of disguised promise. There was space, there was opportunity, but for the little thrown-together 18

community in a place they called Danevang, there was a continuation of the initial hardship and disillusionment, only it was hotter. It was so different from what they had grown up with, the first few years their farming

ambitions were in conflict with the soil and climate. From a former life of oats, wheat and maybe a cow on a couple of acres, they had land as far as they could see, but didn’t know what to do with it. A COTTON-PICKIN’ MOMENT Crop failure led some to sell-up after only a couple of seasons. Those who remained, with help from some Norwegian and other European settlers, turned to cot ton, turned debt into profit and over time contributed to Texas being the number one producer in the States. Even today, 120 years on, Danevang is dominated by its cotton mill. There was a second exodus after 1911 when some families were lured to another Danish settlement, Solvang, in California. Very much alive and kicking and a hundred or so kilometers to the north, a new bunch of Danes are contributing to the 2020 version of endeavor and resilience – they’ve already struck a chord with what was officially

proclaimed in 1995, ‘the Danish Capital of Texas’. ‘I love that place, it’s so impressive,’ says Danevang Heritage Preservation Society President Sandra Petersen. She’s referring to the relatively new Maersk Training centre in Houston. History shows that the Danes were not a major influx during the growth of the new American nation. Life at home was hard, but there was no political abuse, no prolonged famine, nothing to trigger an exodus westward so mass as with the Irish, Norwegians and Swedes. The new Danes form just a small section of the tapestry that is Texas today. Both parties, the farmers and the oilmen are part of industries that are light years away from their origins. The cotton industry has transformed from a backbreaking, labour-intensive method of converting something out of the ground that ends up not just as the T-shirt on your

Cotton is now picked and bailed by machines

Deep In The Heart Of Texas

Irvin takes his finger back 80 years to find himself in the front row of the school photograph

Deep In The Heart Of Texas

back, but in dozens for products from salad oil to cardboard. It is nothing like the industry that started midway between Dallas and Houston in the town of Corsicana, just months before the Danes arrived in Danevang. Back then it was a messy, primitive, dangerous business where the end-product was delivered at a cost in terms of human misery. Today it is still dangerous, but it is a factor that is mitigated by technological advancement and increasingly focused training. It is the US’s biggest cash crop and Texas, with almost a third of all production, is by far the biggest of the eleven Cotton Belt states. LEARNING SPACE Danevang itself has undergone change. Only four family’s that farm today can link themselves back to the founding fathers. It has clung on to its heritage through a combination of ill-fortune turning to good and through people with no Danish DNA still recognizing the importance of identity and

history. Sandra, of SwedishNorwegian roots, guided me round the barn-styled museum that is one of the central attractions. It is crammed with Danarama – from blue and white plates to hand-embroidered tableware, from crude farm equipment to fading photos of the school that once taught Danish. Looking at the school photos was Irvin Wind. His grandfather’s name is on the monument outside commemorating 1895; his grandfather and much of his family are part of the silent community in the churchyard next door. At a very sprightly 86 Irvin looked for and found himself in one of the school photos. He was just seven and one of five brothers. His personal story reflects much of the change that Danevang has endured. He was born into an inventive society, one that had the telephone before the telephone company arrived – the resourceful townsfolk ran the signal along the barbed-wire that fenced their farms.

Irvin’s first break from the community was when they discovered that he lived on the southern side of the county line that went right through the town and meant that he and his brothers had to get their schooling about ten miles south and not just yards away on their doorstep. Schooling has played a major part in altering rural life worldwide. Sons and daughters with no prospect of a life on the farm, now with an education moved on and away.

that captures every event that Danevang has witnessed. One of the most critical was the hurricane of 1945. It took away the fulcrum of the community, the Lutheran church. ‘It was in the days before Atlantic hurricanes had names, but it was worse than Harvey,’ says Sandra. She knows that because Danevang has contributed to the Texas weather bureau for over a century. ‘Harvey dropped 19” of rain, in forty-five, 26” fell and the church was blown away.’

SPACE LEARNING Irvin now lives in El Campo, about ten miles away, but as an engineer he has travelled and some of his out-of-this-world projects have travelled even further. Working for NASA for twenty plus years, he was in the department that checked that everything was OK for the Apollo moonshots and the Space Shuttle, a far shot from picking cotton.

It was replaced by a near lookalike from an army camp that had been decommissioned. Today Danevang has a collection of buildings, erected or brought together by the Danish Heritage Preservation Society, a non-profit organisation that has to rely on its own fund-raising guile to keep the Dane in vang.

In the barn he was able to trace his roots in the big red book 21

The local store is called Dane, owned by a Dane, but run by a Mexican. Inside it is dark, only lit by the glass-fronted fridges

Deep In The Heart Of Texas

Much of what was in the Jensenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s 1895 kitchen would not look out of place today

Deep In The Heart Of Texas

stacked with Gatorade, Coke and beers. The food is more taco than rugbrød and ‘Nobody speaks Danish,’ says Suzan Brendt, another name that is on the founders’ memorial. ‘With a Hispanic community making up 55% of the folk around here, we speak Spanish if anything as a second language.’ The recently built barn, the centre of the museum, is crammed with the everyday tools of the early settlers and what they made the cotton into. On one wall there is a crude, but effective, family tree that regularly changes. Today it was the Petersen’s, not Sandra’s side, ‘one of the other ones.’ Sandra was sitting at an adjacent long kitchen table, separated from Irvin by the big red book. IKEA 1895 STYLE With little trouble Irvin, flicking through the index, found his grandfather, one of Danevang’s founders, and reflected on changed times. From plough to space probe, he’d seen and lived

it all. Unshared history is dead and as if to underline its need and perpetual value, a young couple, smartphones in hand, entered the barn.

What’s the state of Texas? Texas is a diverse state. Only Hawaii and California have a greater blend of ethnic origins and this century Texas became the top destination for immigrants. Spanish is the second language and is spoken in 30% of homes. If you walked on the streets of Laredo you’d have to ask for directions in Spanish, as over 90% of communication is conducted in it. There are other specialist tongues like Texas Czech and Texas German. Place names like Odessa, Edinburg, Florence, Athens, London and most famously Paris, have Texas after them and a originating story before them.

Drawn by his distant Danishness, the young guy explained why they ‘simply had’ to look in. Within five minutes a direct family connection had been established and Irvin escorted his newest relatives around. They left the barn, past the flags at halfmast for the recent church gun slaughter in nearby Sutherland Springs and headed to the most costly exhibit to upkeep, a complete house.

In the first decades of the 19th Century famine and revolution lead to a massive influx of northern Europeans joining the longestablished Spanish settlers in what was up to that time a part of Mexico, but one that was seeking its independence. That was gained in 1835, but continued insecurity lead Texas to become the 28th State ten years later.

The Jensen’s home was moved from its pioneering position less than a kilometer away to the site in the 1990’s. It was the second time in a hundred years it had been transported. It was bought, every square inch of it and everything in it, from a Sears Roebuck catalogue. Inside it is a comforting reminder that sometimes the past comes round

again. The house, model 115, was transported, erected and painted for $725. That was in 1895 – nearly $20,000 at today’s value. One hundred kilometers to the north in a popular four-lettered Scandinavian superstore, some of today’s Danish settlers were mulling over what to buy. The raw wood kitchen top, the 23

sunken white porcelain basin, the utensils, the duck blue colour scheme, if not identical, decidedly similar to the Jensen’s catalogue buy, yet over a century apart. What will become of the wind and oil industries in one hundred years?

The story of an unsung star-struck hero

The A to Y of Texan History W

hen, in 2015, they hoisted the Maersk Training sign onto the wall of the Houston centre, it, in a very silent, unassuming way, made Texas no longer the ‘lone star state’. But don’t mention that to any Texan, they are very protective about their lone star. However there is a strong likelihood that there’s a connection between the sevenpointed Maersk star and that on the state’s flag – they both could have Danish origins. Certainly the Maersk flag has a very firm beginning, it was on the funnel of Captain Peter Mærsk Møller’s first ship and adopted by him as a thank you to an answered prayer for his wife’s recovery from a serious illness. The Texan flag has a more uncertain heritage. However there is a reasonably believable

storyline that goes like this. In 1834 after the death of his mother Charles Zanco at the age of 26 along with his widowed father emigrated from Randers in Jutland. Farmers, they bought a piece of land on a river which today is smack bang in the centre of downtown Houston. In fact they, with land at Buffalo Bayou, were pretty well founding fathers. Texas was part of Mexico way back then and in the rumblings for self-rule. Within a year of arriving Charles joined a group of volunteers in Lynchburg. A painter, he was called upon to help convert a strip of dark blue silk into a flag for the company.

siege of Bexar. Promoted to lieutenant he stayed on and then moved to the short distance to the Alamo Mission in February 1836. Eleven days later he was one of the 189 defenders to die and pass into legend, well almost. Charles’ place in history is some what anonymous – his name is missing from the memorial that today honours those who fought and died in the mission. One undeniable fact is that Charles Zanco is not carved in stone, it has been suggested perhaps because the engraver miscalculated and ran out of space when he came to Z. As a strange twist, the missing name may be of little consequence. There is a proposal from George P. Bush, son of Jeb, to have The Spirit of Sacrifice statue moved, possibly mothballed or destroyed. This is

MONUMENTAL ERROR It is believed that he painted a single white star and then was encouraged to add the contro versial word ‘Independence’ under it. It was carried at the

on the grounds that its existence is politically insensitive to the growing majority of the population and by that the people the politicians need, the New Texans. The New Texans used to be called Mexicans, great great grandchildren of the guys who won at the Alamo.

Although known as the Lone Star State, three other states use a single star, Arizona, Nevada and North Carolina. Thirteen of the states have stars on their flags. The others are: Alaska 8, Arkansas 27, Georgia 13, Indiana 19, Mississippi 13, Missouri 24, New Hampshire 9, North Dakota 13 and Tennessee 3.

Charlesâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; place in history is somewhat anonymous â&#x20AC;&#x201C; his name is missing from the memorial that today honours those who fought and died in the mission.

There’s a large room in Maersk Training in Houston where nobody wants to go, but they are thankful once they get inside. No other Maersk centre has a room like this. It is not for training, but for safe shelter from the sort of violent weather that Texas can whip up in a moment. Not so much for protection from hurricanes like Harvey that follow a slow if unpredictable path, but a tornado, what some call twisters.

A Room With No View

other than safety from tornados

he room is smack in the middle of the centre and to meet requirements it is windowless – it’s basically a high walled box , barren of furniture, for it is not planned for lengthy visits. Tornadoes don’t hang around. They move at an average of 30mph (50kph) and can so you are not going to outrun it. It can be 75 meters across at the base and

they a moderate one will travel about 1.6 kms before dissipating. They don’t happen regularly, especially in northern Houston, but it is nice to know that there is somewhere you can seek sanctuary. It has so far been utilized on one occasion, a full evacuation for a BP crew in the middle of the course. The most damaging and deadliest tornado in the state’s history claimed 114 lives, 1,600 homes and 2,000 cars in a few minutes near Waco in 1953. Like the Titanic’s sinking leading to proper lifeboat regulation and ice patrols, the Waco disaster lead to the first proper tracking and alerting of tornadoes. There are other storm rooms where sanctuary can be sought at the centre. Protected in the middle of the building, the toilets also offer safe relief.

Howdy Houston F

rom closing the front door to logging on to your office desktop, how long did it take you to get to work today? It took me 5 minutes 20 seconds – a bit longer than average, delayed because the windscreen needed defrosting. By bike it is eight minutes, on foot, twenty eight and a half. The walking time is the same as the average time workers in Houston take to get in – but you don’t walk in Houston, it is America’s car city. Detroit makes them, Houston drives them. Houston comes 13th in American cities in terms of commuting time, but it is a figure, as anyone in Houston knows, that is totally unreal. It is reduced because people leave for work at ridiculous hours in order to beat the traffic. And there’s a lot of it – more people drive to work in Houston than anywhere else, 91%. One government survey places Houstonians in their cars

WHERE BIG GETS BIGGER Living in Europe it is hard to grasp the enormity of Houston. If the metropolitan city were to be a country it would rank at 146 in terms of size out of 197 nations, ahead of Macedonia, Israel, Kuwait and Qatar. As a geographical entity, excluding small island states, Greater Houston would only have four countries with an elevation lower than it. Downtown the land rises to 15 meters whilst the highest point in the suburbs is a staggering 131 meters. So what you get is a 2D city where it is hard to grasp a sense of location or geography. It only reveals itself teasingly in the few moments it takes to go up and over one of the numerous intersections. Apart from the offices and shops downtown, these are the highest points in the city.

for longer than any other city dwellers. A bus in Houston is an object of curiosity. A footpath that actually leads somewhere, a planning accident. The travel time figure is further distorted by the number of big companies that purposefully locate in districts outside the city centre just to be convenient for their workforce. What this does is make cross-city business meetings a nightmare. A journey that takes 20 minutes at certain times of the day can take an hour or more. Travelling isn’t done in miles or minutes it is done in Houstime – the locals know it, it’s like an additional sense. It is not something that can be explained or passed on, it’s just an automatic gift the Houstonians have. They don’t see inconvenience, they see travelling opportunities and get on with it.

Without a car in the fourth largest city in the States, you have about

as much freedom of movement as an inmate in an open prison. People stare at you as you walk with that ‘what’s he up to, can’t he find the car lot?’ look. I’m not a big fan of hotel bars or restaurants. There you only meet fellow inmates. Sneaking out to a neighborhood bar required crossing a street that in Europe would be a four-lane motorway, in Africa a runway. You could taxi planes up and down it. At the junction separating me from a cool cheap beer, the traffic lights are so programmed for vehicles that, in the mid-day sun, you go brown before the man goes green. Once inside the Hoots County Saloon you are in an American oasis. I’m not a heavy drinker, I just collect bars, and this was a gem. Not so much for the décor or the way the barmaid remained a rare cocktail of allure and aloof, but for the unique drinking experience I was just about to

Poopdeck 31

of them. If you don’t have a car in Houston, you Uber. Or you don’t, as in my case, you just pay and stay where you are. It was a Saturday afternoon and I’d already successfully taken two Uber journeys, but not without difficulty. My phone only picked up the app on wifi, so I had to resort to hanging suspiciously outside offices and shops until I got a signal to order a return trip. Every journey away from my base hotel felt like Apollo 13, Houston I had problems.

Denmark’s second biggest island, Funen from 110 miles up and with the same prospective you don’t really leave Greater Houston. enjoy. I’d just finished a locally brewed beer when another landed on a serviette beside the now empty glass. I looked at Rene, that was her name, and she said ‘A guy’s just bought the bar a drink.’ I looked around as Rene dispensed beers to about eighteen people. ‘Which guy?’ I asked. She looked, ‘he’s gone out back for a smoke.’

the nothingness. He was maybe a truck driver, maybe an electrician, or a cowboy. I asked ‘was there a special reason to celebrate and if so could I congratulate him.’ Without a smile he replied in a slow Texan drawl, ‘nope, I just like to see people happy.’ I thanked him for the moment as much as the drink.

Out on the veranda a guy stood alone, leaning against a pole, cigarette in the corner of his mouth and looking like a Marlboro ad, he stared out into

UBER AND OUT I guessed he wasn’t a bus driver since that would have been too rare an experience, or even a taxi driver, for there are equally few

It’s a well-known fact that there is more technology in a smartphone than there was in the entire Apollo space craft, but I felt as helpless as Mission Control when I ordered Uber driver Irene. She was ‘new to job’ it turned out. Sitting waiting in Hoots Saloon, since along with the occasional free beer, it had free wifi, I could see her on the app, making her way to my original pick-up location, the hotel. Waiting to

see Irene re-route to my changed location, she set off, passed by, and headed to Interstate 45. I rang and was told ‘you’re onboard’. She reached my requested location, an electronics superstore and ping I got the bill, for 6.6 miles in 12 minutes, $10.96. I protested and ordered another beer, happy in the fact that she’d probably saved me a fortune in not buying some must-have gadget I’d never quite work out the instructions to use. Uber and out.

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