Ride of a lifetime

An old photo (scanned from a print from an old colour slide) posted just for fun, taken on 28 January 1967, on a helicopter ride from Doha, Qatar (Middle East) to the Seashell oil rig. This was just a day trip for worker's wives, to look around the rig and to thoroughly enjoy a wonderful lobster meal : ) The flight took 45-60 minutes and was so noisy, but it's not every day that you get the chance to ride in a helicopter! This photo was taken when we had landed on the small landing pad on the rig. Before we left Doha at 9:30 a.m., we had to be weighed, life jackets were tied around our waist and safety belts were fastened. On the outward journey, we flew over and round the Sidewinder oil rig and over the production station where gas burns in huge flames into the air. After a cup of coffee, we were shown around the rig, including watching men unloading small lengths of a core (sample of the rocks that existed below the seabed where the rig was located) from a pipe - filthy work! There were numerous steep, "open" steps all over the rig and everywhere was oily and slippery (hence the hardhat for each of us). When you looked down, you saw nothing but an expanse of blue sea a long way below, with many large, thin fish with long snouts. We also saw a couple of Rays flapping in the water, and a sea snake. About 1:00 p.m., we had dinner: vegetable soup, Lobster Thermadore, chicken, boiled potatoes, cauliflower, pineapple and cream, and coffee. It wasn't a special meal for us - it's just that the food on Seashell was very good! Three o'clock came and it was time for us to leave. The helicopter ride back to Doha took an hour because we flew round the small island of Halul where the oil was piped into tankers.