Drilling rig report for March 1
By Brian Zinchuk
ESTEVAN - With roughly just two weeks to go until spring breakup, there were 39 active drilling rigs working in Saskatchewan on March 1.
That’s according to RiggerTalk.com, which publishes data from the Canadian Association of Energy Contractors.
Activity has picked up in northwest Saskatchewan, with eight rigs working. Rife Resources had a rig northeast of Marshall. Canadian Natural Resources Limited had one rig straight north of Maidstone. Cenvous Energy Inc. employed one rig at Rush Lake, and a second at Vawn. Strathcona Resources had two rigs making hole, south of Meota and northeast of Prince.
This is a Betts Drilling rig a long time ago on a lease, not that far away. But it was damned cold that night. Photo by Brian Zinchuk
Lycos Energy Inc had one rig at the intersection of Highways 21 and 40, west of Cut Knife. This is an area which has seen new activity in recent months. Southeast of Neilberg, Baytex Energy was drilling with one rig.
Moving into west central Saskatchewan, there were 13 rigs working. Longshore Resources was drilling straight north of Macklin, on Highway 17.
Strathcona’s third rig was at Cactus Lake. Baytex had two rigs working southwest of Superb. Whitecap Resources Inc. had one rig north of Coleville.
Novus Energy had one rig northwest of Flaxcombe, while Teine Energy had one rig north of Flaxcombe and two rigs northeast of Kindersley. A forth Teine rig was working northwest of Plato.
A Strathcona rig showed up due south of Eston in what appears to be a new area. However, sometimes when this happens, it could be because of a one digit error in the data entry, thus displacing the rig laterally north, south, east or west.
Baytex had a rig south of Elrose, and Saturn Oil & Gas had one rig east of Plato.
In southwest Saskatchewan, four rigs were making holes. “NAH” had one rig southwest of Success. This could possibly be North American Helium, but the description calls it a directional oil well. North of South Fork but west of Shaunavon, another rig definitively shows “North American Helium,” and its well type says “directional – other.”
Right on Highway 13 between Eastend and Shaunavon, Crescent Point Energy Corp. had one rig working.
Whitecap also had a rig working halfway between Gull Lake and Shaunavon.
Finally, southeast Saskatchewan had 14 rigs working. Whitecap had a rig working in the Weyburn Unit, a second east of Benson, and a third right beside Lampman.
Crescent Point had two rigs working close to each other in the Viewfield area, and a third east of Corning.
Tundra Oil & Gas had one rig close to Torquay.
North of Lampman, Villanova had one rig going. Northeast of North Portal, Vermilion Energy Inc had one rig at work. Anova Resources Inc. employed one rig north of Oxbow, near the dam. Right at Manor, Triland Energy had one rig going.
West of Carnduff, Saturn had one rig, and south of Carnduff, a few kilometres from the U.S. border, Axial Exploration was drilling with one rig. Just north of Gainsborough, Burgess Creek Exploration was drilling with one rig.