Inside The Walls Of Fort Chesapeake Is A Beehive Of Fuming Fracking Activity

Frac Job Underway In Fort Chesapeake On Wednesday

On Sunday the gate to my neighborhood Fort Chesapeake was wide open.

So, I walked inside the notorious walls.

That day, January 8, I saw the Frac Job was due to start January 10.

In the photo, from a couple hours ago, you can see that there is now a lot going on inside the walls of Fort Chesapeake.

It really is quite astonishing to see how much equipment is brought in and put in place. It looks as if it would be a logistics nightmare.

Whatever it is that is involved with Fracking, it is very noisy.

Can you see that grayish discoloration in the photo, above the white piece of equipment? That looks like exhaust fumes? It is rising from what looked to me to be the location of the hole that was poked in the ground, so the Fracking Water can reach the Barnett Shale and Frac it.

Inside The Walls Of Fort Chesapeake On Sunday

I smelled nothing foul, unlike my previous close up encounter with a Frac Job, that being the notorious Scott Avenue well on the west side of the Tandy Hills.

With the noise of what sounded like a lot of engines running one would think I would have at least detected diesel fumes.

I have no idea how long this Fracking is going to last. This is totally different than my other nearby Chesapeake Energy well operation.

That time there were days of long lines of trucks. I assumed they were bringing in the Fracking Water.

Now I"m thinking maybe those long lines of trucks were taking away the used contaminated Fracking Water.

The first drill pad in my neighborhood is closer to the Trinity River, with the current water sucking pipeline running right by that previous Chesapeake operation. I saw the pipeline today, running from the Trinity River, under Randol Mill Road and then in a creek bed, heading up the hill, past my first neighborhood Chesapeake drilling site, then to Fort Chesapeake.

So, I guess I have the long line of trucks part of this operation to look forward too.

Up Before The Sun The Second Tuesday Of 2012 After A Night Of Explosions Had Me Wondering About Chesapeake Energy's Barnett Shale Fracking

Looking out my primary viewing portal on the world at the pre-dawn darkness I see no stars or rain falling. I am assuming we are still under a rain producing cloud cover in North Texas.

According to my computer temperature monitoring device it is only 39 degrees, currently, in the outer world at my location.

Today is the 2nd Tuesday of the New Year. Already almost a third of the first month of 2012 is gone.

I was exhausted by early evening, last night, which had me horizontal fairly early.

Around 3 in the morning an explosive noise woke me up. At first I thought it was thunder. The follow up explosive noises were clearly not thunder-like.

I don't know what was causing the booming. It lasted, intermittently, for a couple hours. This put me into insomniac mode.

Sometime around the 4th or 5th boom it occurred to me that this booming could have something to do with today's scheduled "Frac Job" at my neighborhood Fort Chesapeake. But, would they actually start something like that in the wee hours of the morning if it made a big noise?

Pondering the "Frac Job" got me obsessing over it in my sleepless state.

Maybe someone has an answer to what I'm obsessing about Frac-wise.

Okay, the hole gets drilled, all the way to the Barnett Shale, a couple thousand feet below the surface. Pipe lines the drilled hole. There is no way a continuous pipe can be inserted into a hole that is a couple thousand feet long.

So, is the pipe installed in sections, joined together somehow? Like the water pipes currently laying on the ground to bring Trinity River water to Fort Chesapeake?

When the drilling process reaches an aquifer, how does that work? How can a drilling process possibly get past a layer of water without polluting that water?

If the well lining is a pipe in sections, how are the joints made to be leak-proof? The pipeline that is bringing water to Fort Chesapeake from the Trinity River is definitely not leak-proof at the joints.

When today's fracking occurs, at the point where the Barnett Shale is fractured and starts producing natural gas, what happens next?

Does all that fracking water get pumped back out?

What stops the newly released natural gas from zooming up the poked hole with explosive force, like the natural gas version of the cliche oil gusher when a drilling operation strikes oil?

Today, with all this fracking going on are there going to be some extra nasty things in the air that I breathe?

Does anyone have any answers to any of these question?

I wish I could say I am going swimming now and think about something else.

The Gates Of Fort Chesapeake Are Still Open But Attended By Vigilant Humans

The gates of my neighborhood Fort Chesapeake were still open today in the noon time frame.

However, the gates are now open with humans inside the Fort.

With a trailer moved in, along with at least 4 outhouses, lighting and a white pickup or two.

Due to wetness falling from the sky above I did my walking today in Wal-Mart and Target. I don't see how Target stays in business. In Wal-Mart I have myself a fine time playing dodge humans, in Target there are very few humans to dodge.

On the way back to my abode, from my shop walk through Wal-Mart and Target, my route takes me through my neighborhood Albertson's parking lot. That is when I saw the gates of Fort Chesapeake were open, but with new things added.

I pulled over on the Albertson's parking lot to take a picture through the water drops on my sideview window.

I only took two photos.

See the guy in a white hardhat standing by the trailer door?

When I stopped my vehicle, parallel to Boca Raton Boulevard, clearly aiming at the open gate of Fort Chesapeake, that guy in the white hard hat started walking towards me.

I finished my picture taking, then took a right turn to head on home. As I pulled out of the Albertson's parking lot the guy in the white hat was looking towards me and my vehicle and writing feverishly on a notepad.

Was he writing down my license number, I paranoiacally wondered? But, then again, was I really being all that paranoid? It is not like I have not had a few encounters with guys in white  pickups guarding pipelines sucking water from the Trinity River.

The fracking begins tomorrow. I have a feeling it is going to be interesting.

The Afternoon View From Miss Puerto Rico's Balcony Of The West Wall Of Fort Chesapeake

Saturday Afternoon Look At Fort Chesapeake

This morning for my requisite first thing in the morning blogging, rather than use a picture of the current view from one of my viewing portals on the world, I used a picture taken last night of the dark view of the West Wall of Fort Chesapeake from Miss Puerto Rico's balcony.

And now it is late in the afternoon of the 2nd Saturday of the next to last month of 2011, so I'm showing you what the daytime view of the West Wall of Fort Chesapeake looks like from Miss Puerto Rico's balcony.

We are looking east in the picture, towards Dallas, which is now blocked from view, by Aubrey McClendon and his cohorts in mayhem.

The daylight view of the West Wall of Fort Chesapeake looks sort of like the wall of a Medieval castle. Not that I've ever seen the wall of a Medieval castle, it's what I imagine such a wall would look like.

Changing the subject from Chesapeake Eyesores to my favorite subject.

The temperature.

Currently it is 74 degrees in the outer world at my location in this parched part of the planet. The temperature currently at my former location in a not parched part of the planet, the Skagit Valley of Washington, is 41 degrees. And it is raining.

The Morning Of The 2nd Saturday Of November Pondering Tearing Down The Walls Of Fort Chesapeake

The Western Wall Of Fort Chesapeake

No, that is not the view from one of my viewing portals on the outer world on this 2nd Saturday morning of the next to last month of 2011.

What you are looking at in the picture is the walls of Fort Chesapeake as viewed last night from Miss Puerto Rico's balcony.

Why is such a thing allowed? Eyesore is too polite a word for it.

If a homeowner decided to put a fence that tall around his house I think, even in Fort Worth, city ordinance enforcers would issue some sort of citation insisting the wall come down.

Mr. McClendon, tear down this wall. I want my view east restored.

Changing the subject from Fort Chesapeake to the temperature.

It is currently heated to 52 degrees in the outer world in my vicinity, shortly after the sun has arrived to begin its daily heating duties.

I think another hike on the Tandy Hills is in my future today. But, before that happens I am going for a morning swim in a pool that will be warmer than it was yesterday morning.