On becoming a Doctor of Dynamite Part One

How on Earth do you go from working as a dock builder in Secret Cove to supervising the blasting on the hairiest section of the Sea to Sky Highway? I'm not really sure myself, and I'm the guy who did it.

Building the curved sections of main dock at Secret Cove Marina

Part way through the construction of Dick Clayton's boathouse for his 53' Fleming

 It began innocently enough with a need for more income. My prized gig in the marine construction business was slowing down due to a bump in the economy and I had four kids, a wife and a house to support. As fate would have it, one of the customers at Secret Cove Marina, was in the blasting business and wanted out. Don Fowler owned Thunderbird Drilling and Blasting, based on the Sunshine Coast. Don did mostly residential work, that is working close to houses and other structures, it requires a high level of skill to successfully work in this end of the game. He had enough of the drill and dynamite business and was looking for something new.

Don Fowler  the guy who taught me the blasting game

 The basics of rock blasting go like this. For whatever reason, a customer needs to remove or break up a solid piece of rock. Maybe they want to build a house on a rock bluff, or put in a road, sometimes the rock needs to be broken....just to make broken rock....what a concept ! The broken rock can be used for fill, or rock walls, road building etc.

Me pushing on a hand- plugger ... eating dust, right outside a log house to make room for an addition

 Now 99.999% of the time, this means that you have to drill into the rock formation, so that explosives can be placed down the borehole and then initiated to shatter the rock. Drilling is the hard and challenging part. Think of it this way, take a perfectly good drilling machine of any type, and then smash it against the rock repeatedly until the drill wins. Sounds like you might break a lot of expensive stuff, doesn't it? Welcome to the world of rock drilling. Holes of various sizes are used, depending on the restrictions of the job. Working close to houses and waterlines and such, demands small-bore holes, like 1 1/4" to 1 3/4" generally, and a lighter explosives load....with a bit more distance you could go to 2 1/4" holes and more explosives in each hole.
 The drilling can be done by air powered "hand-pluggers"  that look like a jack-hammer, but are actually percussion drills. From there, the sky is the limit, Air-tracks, tank-drills, various high speed hydraulic drills, excavator mounted drills and on up the line. The borehole sizes going up as well, 4" to 16" and even larger on special high volume shots. The name of the drilling game is to drill fast, accurately and get to the depth desired without destroying too much of the gear. The drilling pattern, depth and spacing is usually based on bore-hole diameter and the desired outcome. Holes too close together will create uncontrollable results when  detonated. Holes too far apart and not deep enough will result in shots that don't break at all and have high bottoms when dug out.

This is pretty close to real life in the drilling and blasting biz ... except these boys behave better than most driller/blasters.

Loading a shot for a house foundation

The owners decided that they needed more room after the construction began, so blast and split inside the form work

Working with Ted's blasting and Midway Power on a road improvement project

Logging road work for Sechelt Creek Contracting

The explosives part of the game comes in several distinct components. The "boom" part can be dynamite, which is a nitro-glycerin based explosive. An emulsion product or synthetic explosive made without nitro-glycerin or any number of fun goodies made from ANFO (fertilizer and diesel fuel).
 There are a variety of ways to initiate the explosives, depending on what kind of results are required, cost restrictions, or the conditions the work is being done in. Then it comes down to the method used to set off the detonator system and that in itself can take many forms. Reliability and safety is at the top of the list for all components.
 In residential or "controlled" blasting, the deal is drill it, load it ( with just the right amount ...not too much ....not too little )  then cover the shot with heavy rubber blast masts weighing several tons apiece, stand clear, take cover and press the "go " button. A heavy thud should be the result, with a good heave of the mats. And Shazaam! broken rock with no damage to the surrounding structures. How do some blasters manage to wreck things when such a good and reliable method exists? Awesome question. The mis-guided and delusional contractor that believes he can do the job faster and cheaper by using bigger holes and more explosives per hole. This will only cause excessive fly rock and seismic shocks. None of which the neighbors will appreciate.
 But enough about that, let's tell some stories.

Swinging blast mats on to the shot right beside the Squamish Highway and the power-lines with fiber-optic cable

Stacking blast mats in  the very early days of the Sea to Sky job

Don Fowler, you gotta love him. He tried desperately to talk me out of the blasting biz. His exact words were "Mike , you really don't want into this bullshit business". I didn't acknowledge a word he said, I wanted in so bad I could taste it. I was blinded by dollar signs. On many a shitty day after that, I wanted to phone him up and let him know how wise his words were. Days when every fucking thing went wrong and then you go home to find the tax department has left a nasty-gram on the answering machine, and a parts bill for a gagillion dollars comes in the mail.
 So, seeing that I wasn't about to quit this craziness. Don went about the chore of teaching me how to drill and blast. I must say that for the record he taught  me well, years later in much larger, complex and downright high risk situations, I used the rules and standards that he emphasized.  So Don, I haven't seen you in years, I hope you are well, and thank you.

Excavator mounted hydraulic rock drill, the highest point of the Eagleridge cut ... it goes down 110 ft from there

Tamrock Ranger 800 rock drill   fast drilling and comfortable for the operator   West Vancouver and Upper Levels highway in the background

A day for the record books.
 Every word of this next bit is true.
 In one of the previous stories, there is a photo of me and a crew building a boathouse for Don McLeod's powerboat. This occurred during that time, and Don McLeod becomes a player also.
 I was in the marina parking lot assembling the trusses for the boathouse. A local business man, a Coast mover and shaker drives in. I've known this guy since I was in high school. He pulls up and calls me over. We chat up a bit, catch up on the latest gossip. Then , out of the blue he says, "Michael my boy, we should go into business together. You want into the blasting game and I wouldn't mind backing you on that." yadda yadda...let's talk and away he goes. I'm stunned. Stunned and elated. woohoo! blasting biz here I come.! Oh no but wait . it gets better.
 No word of a lie, as that guy drives out, another old friend drives in. They pass each other in the marina parking lot. This fellow is older and retired,  and sitting on more money than God himself. He pulls up and calls me over to his car. He starts off slow with asking about the family and what not, before breaking into, Michael, you know if you ever need anything of any sort, anything at all, I'd expect you to call me first. I'd appreciate it if you asked. Now because this guy doesn't have a strong back or a pick-up truck, I'm thinking that he is offering me the use of his check book. with in reason of course. That goes with out saying doesn't it? Right. And the scene is set for big changes to come in my comfy little life.

A blasting job right smack dab in the middle of the Upper Levels Highway, just before the ferry terminal for a sign base

 I worked with Don Fowler for about two years, learning the biz and improving my skills. A meeting on the street changed the course of my intended plans, which was to buy  Don's blasting company and allow him to move on. An offer came to me from a local developer who was going to need extensive blasting work to put in roads and house sites. His deal to me was, get set up and come and do this project, but he doesn't want Thunderbird involved.  These local players all have there reasons for such decisions, some of them can be petty and downright mean. I went to Don and asked him to sell me his company so that we could both get on with things.