Birth Pangs of a Boom

More than 10,000 workers--petroleum engineers and roustabouts, cooks and nurses--are standing by for the historic moment. Next week, after six years of hassle, the first 80-ft. section of pipe will finally be laid in the biggest private construction project in history: the much needed, $6 billion Alaska pipeline. When it is finished in mid-1977, a 798-mile conduit will begin to bring as much as 2 million bbl. of oil a day from the wind-bitten wastes of the far north to the ice-free port of Valdez. The oil will be shipped by tanker to the Lower 48, making the U.S. much less dependent on imports, which now amount to some 6 million bbl. a day.

The pipeline will stretch across frigid snow fields, Arctic marsh, mosquito-ridden scrub and high mountains. For a variety of reasons--to prevent the warm oil from melting the permafrost, to allow passage of the migratory caribou--the pipe will be sunk deep into the ground for roughly half the distance and raised from 2 ft. to 22 ft. above the surface for the other half. Because of these safeguards, environmentalists have muted their earlier criticisms. One pipeline official says that the environmental impact will be "about as serious as a pencil line on a football field." But state authorities worry about the social impact of the great inflow of outsiders.

They are being drawn by word that the project will soon need several thousand more workers. For a typical 70-hour week, dishwashers already earn $720, laborers $920 or more, and electricians $1,219. Many of them are veteran oil-field boomers who have honed their skills in East Texas, Saudi Arabia and the jungles of Peru. They are at home in the frontier ambience of Valdez, which has two liquor stores for every grocery, and Fairbanks, which will be the midpoint on the pipeline. One worker came into Fairbanks and started playing Monopoly--with real money.

The work is hard and often dangerous. Already 26 men have been killed in pipeline-related accidents, mostly in plane crashes. Far up north, the winter night can last more than 50 days, and the chill factor recently dropped to minus 128DEG; exposed flesh can freeze in 30 seconds. Most of the men will live in prefabricated buildings along the route, working long stretches and then taking a week or so off. Apartments--for spending the off periods--are scarce and costly. In the cities, monthly rentals run to more than $500 for a modest two-bedroom flat.

Cosmic Cost. What is more, jobs are so tough to get that many people are left out of the boom. An unskilled worker showing up at a union hall can find himself No. 10,000 on a waiting list. Nonetheless, an exodus from the Lower 48 has been snaking up the Alaska Highway. Many a frustrated job seeker sleeps on the floor of a mission or in his car--until he is forced to sell it in order to meet the cosmic cost of food.

Alaska's unemployment rate is 11.4% and rising. The 49th state, which once sorely needed settlers, now has more than it can handle. Says its labor commissioner, Edmund Orbeck: "We put ads in the newspapers saying 'Don't come'--and still they come."

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