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View Full Version : Digging for oil in wick gardens??!!!



Fran
01-Mar-06, 00:28
Has anyone else in wick had a company, on behalf of the highland council, drill boreholes in their gardens for the purpose of collecting and testing soil samples in wick??
One borehole has been drilled in my front garden using a small tracked rig today in the heavy snow!!they are coming back tomorrow. why? What for? Is there oil in my front garden? Is this the reason all the shops and houses are being built?!!!
The company are from london......a long way to come to wick and get soil samples...very odd.

connieb19
01-Mar-06, 00:30
Has anyone else in wick had a company, on behalf of the highland council, drill boreholes in their gardens for the purpose of collecting and testing soil samples in wick??
One borehole has been drilled in my front garden using a small tracked rig today in the heavy snow!!they are coming back tomorrow. why? What for? Is there oil in my front garden? Is this the reason all the shops and houses are being built?!!!
The company are from london......a long way to come to wick and get soil samples...very odd.Wow, this could all be very exciting fran....keep us posted!!:)

angela5
01-Mar-06, 00:35
Has anyone else in wick had a company, on behalf of the highland council, drill boreholes in their gardens for the purpose of collecting and testing soil samples in wick??


Not yet fran..interesting!! keep us posted..:D

Did you not ask them????

angela5
01-Mar-06, 00:38
Oh fran i did hear seatter dump is now full they are looking for more land[lol]

krieve
01-Mar-06, 00:41
Very interesting there has to be a reason why all the interest and developments in caithness

krieve
01-Mar-06, 00:49
fran what is the name of the company

Moira
01-Mar-06, 00:49
This is the first I've heard of this. I live in the same area as you Fran but no-one has asked to test the soil here. There's obviously a better class of soil in your street -lol :D If I were you I would ask HRC for the reasons behind it - if they're about to strike oil around here we need to be prepared. I could help you to hi-jack some pipes the next time they pass here on their way to Wester [smirk]

angela5
01-Mar-06, 00:53
I could help you to hi-jack some pipes the next time they pass here on their way to Wester [smirk]

[lol] hee...hee...

Fran
01-Mar-06, 01:34
i did ask Highland council and the one workman and his supervisor but they wouldn't say. they had a van with all the equipment and an estate car. It was a driller that made a lot of noise and dug very deeply. the company is called Global Probing and Sampling, environmental and geotechnical and sampling specialists!!!!! they did the same in my neighbours garden, and said they had one more to do on the other side of wick before returning to their base. i even gave them a cup of tea to bribe more info from them but it didn't work....you would think it was top secret!!!!

Rheghead
01-Mar-06, 03:09
Just a thought, you may be able to turn these boreholes to your advantage if they are deep enough. They may be suitable for use as boreholes for Ground source heating. Frankly, if you had to pay for it yersel, it would cost a bomb.

All you have to do is make sure it doesn't cave in on itself then get a plumber to put in the system in for you at great saving to yersel.

Bill Fernie
01-Mar-06, 09:31
It is possible that this has to do with the new Contaminated Land regualtions. All councils are making checks on land in many places to test forr contamination on sites previously used for industrial purposes.

Depending on what was aorund your area at present or in the past it could be that this is the reason. There is nothing necessarily wrong but checks arebeing made in many places. If the men would not say check with Highland Council offices to get an answer.

You will have seen the recent announcments about Castletown. There is nothing wrong necessarily but checks are ongoing and many more will be done at many sites across the whole country.

If you live near anything that might have had an industrial process in the past then you might expect tests to be carried out in coming months and years.

You might also find you live some way away from the sites where the process took place as liquid or gases can travel in the ground. Many samll towns once had indudtries that have long since gone but the residues remain in the ground for a very long time in some cases.

However in Fran's case the bore holes may be for something completely different.

DrSzin
01-Mar-06, 11:08
i did ask Highland council and the one workman and his supervisor but they wouldn't say. they had a van with all the equipment and an estate car. It was a driller that made a lot of noise and dug very deeply. the company is called Global Probing and Sampling, environmental and geotechnical and sampling specialists!!!!! they did the same in my neighbours garden, and said they had one more to do on the other side of wick before returning to their base. i even gave them a cup of tea to bribe more info from them but it didn't work....you would think it was top secret!!!!If anyone came to drill holes in my garden but refused to tell me why they were doing it, I would tell them to get lost! There is no way I would let anyone do such a thing.

DW
01-Mar-06, 11:26
If anyone came to drill holes in my garden but refused to tell me why they were doing it, I would tell them to get lost! There is no way I would let anyone do such a thing.

Not much use if it's a council house.

DrSzin
01-Mar-06, 12:09
Not much use if it's a council house.Never thought of that. :o

Saveman
01-Mar-06, 12:11
I just suddenly got an image of the Beverly hillbillies......."and up from the ground came a bubbling crude.....oil that is.....black gold.......texas tea...."

:lol:

golach
01-Mar-06, 12:12
I just suddenly got an image of the Beverly hillbillies......."and up from the ground came a bubbling crude.....oil that is.....black gold.......texas tea...."

:lol:
Texas Tea....thats why we're called "Tea in a Bowla's" :lol:

Nivelo
01-Mar-06, 13:21
GRRRRRR, they just woke me and my dad up, we both do night's and because most of the houses around us our council they've been diging up for ages! what a hell of a noise!

shrek_donkey
01-Mar-06, 13:24
go out and ask them why they are doing it and could they make less noise you are trying to sleep.

katarina
01-Mar-06, 13:54
there's something going on in a garden in George street. I wondered what it was.....mmm oil in George street.....just a thought, if you own the ground, does that mean you are going to be rich?

Ann
01-Mar-06, 15:54
What if it is not oil they are looking for but something more sinister........:confused:?
Maybe we've got a real murder, mystery story right here!!!! :evil
How's about that then.......;) ?

wickerinca
01-Mar-06, 21:17
Yeah......see all you people thinking that Wick is going to strike it rich...............but it may be bodies they are looking for. Just what have you been up to fran??;)

George Brims
01-Mar-06, 21:35
Just because you're in a council house doesn't mean you have to let anyone do anything they like on the property. If you pay rent for a piece of property surely that gives you all the rights and privileges of ownership. I'm sure if I had a front garden on typical Caithness land, I wouldn't want somebody drilling a hole and bringing a lot of that claggy clay to the top!

angela5
01-Mar-06, 21:37
Just what have you been up to fran??;)

Has the naked rambler gone missing by any chance?[lol]

Cedric Farthsbottom III
01-Mar-06, 21:44
Has anyone else in wick had a company, on behalf of the highland council, drill boreholes in their gardens for the purpose of collecting and testing soil samples in wick??
One borehole has been drilled in my front garden using a small tracked rig today in the heavy snow!!they are coming back tomorrow. why? What for? Is there oil in my front garden? Is this the reason all the shops and houses are being built?!!!
The company are from london......a long way to come to wick and get soil samples...very odd.

Noo this is weird Fran as about 7 months ago,was having a discussion with some friends in the Francis Street Club and we were plondering about why all of a sudden all these big shopping businesses and property developments were coming to Wick.....and one of the guys said he heard fae a friend o' a friend that oil had been found in Caithness.Fran pal,Ye better get your ten gallon hat....becuse ye could be becoming the J.R Ewing of Caithness:lol:

Fran
02-Mar-06, 01:58
I read all your answers with interest and some were so funny.
The men have gone now, there was no mess, the hole was not big and has a lid on it. i dont think i could have refused but I have not been told a reason. It was former council land and house, but there was no mess or anything so I wasn't bothered. It is not my house in George Street.
I am a bit concerned that bill thinks it could possibly be contaminated land. I know in the past there was a huge timber yard and saw mill around here owned by a family who owned a lot of property around here in the days gone by. there was also a stream near by but i have been unable to find out more history.
No, the naked rambler isnt here, he is in edinburgh and he wouldnt fit down the hole.
I keep looking but no oil has popped up yet, but i keep hoping, as long as it doesnt go on my car.
Maybe they were not real borehole men, maybe it was the robbers planting the money deep in my garden, I must dig it up tomorrow just in case. Sue-ellen Ewing ha ha

captainbubba
02-Mar-06, 04:41
katrina, when you own ground, you only actually own the top foot. anything
below that belongs to the crown (government). there for if there was any
thing below that there is only one winner again.

as for the earlier question about why all the houses and shops are getting
built in wick i believe it is because they are planning building a fast reactor
at dounreay once the ongoing decommissioning is completed.