June 4, 2025 • 40 mins
The CWB Association had the privilege to attend the Skills Canada New Brunswick Provincial Competition in Saint John, NB. Join us as we bring you special episodes recorded in person to advocate for careers in skilled trades and technology across the country.
What does it take for a woman to thrive as a welding inspector at one of North America's largest oil refineries? Bella Hicks brings us behind the scenes of her remarkable journey from making a strategic decision to pursue the specialized Welding Engineering Technology program at NBCC Moncton. Unlike standard welding programs, this intensive two-year curriculum delves into the metallurgical science behind the craft. "I wanted to know the why," Bella explains, highlighting how understanding the underlying principles makes troubleshooting welds infinitely more effective than simply "turning knobs." Being young and female in a predominantly male industry brings unique challenges, but Bella's approach is refreshingly straightforward. Rather than dwelling on barriers, she focuses on building trust through competence and communication. Her story isn't just about breaking stereotypes—it's about crafting a fulfilling life through skilled trades.
Ready to see where your welding journey might lead? Subscribe now to hear more inspiring stories from across the industry.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
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Happy welding.
Hello and welcome to anotheredition of the CWB Association
podcast Today.
I am in beautiful New Brunswickand St John.
(01:08):
Here for today's skillscompetition no-transcript.
(01:33):
So first of all, I love yourname, Bella.
Speaker 2 (01:35):
Thank you.
I'm sure you hear that all thetime I do.
I also get that's my dog's namea lot.
Well, I do have friends who'salso but my name's Max.
Speaker 1 (01:46):
so I get that a lot too.
Yeah, probably Bella meansbeautiful in Italian, right it
does Bella yeah.
Yeah, see there my Italianco-editor, podcast manager here.
All right, so let's start withwhat you're doing out here at
NBCC today.
What brought you out here?
Speaker 2 (02:05):
Yeah, I'm out here with a company that I'm working
for right now, cam.
I'm located at the St JohnRefinery.
Right now I'm doing weldinginspections.
So they wanted someone fromindustry to come out kind of
represent what they're doing.
So I'm just I set up a boothfor a tri-trade for some younger
high school kids to come outand try it out.
So we have some uh littlespecimens set up.
(02:27):
they can come try looking at,well, measuring stuff kind of
what we do on a daily basis, andI got a little questionnaire
set up for them.
Yeah, trying to recruit thenext uh generation of of
inspectors yeah, yeah, trying toget people to stay here and get
some jobs in New Brunswick, youknow.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
Well, that's what we've been talking about.
You know it came up as a topica few times.
Is the work in New Brunswickright?
The rest of Canada kind of hasthis idea that there isn't work
out in the Maritimes.
Speaker 2 (02:56):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (02:57):
You know, because we typically see all the people in
the Maritimes.
The tradespeople come outduring shutdown season out west
yeah all the people in theMaritimes, the tradespeople come
out during shutdown season.
Out west it's a very commontheme that we get people from
Nova Scotia, new Brunswick,newfoundland, pei showing up in
Alberta and Saskatchewan aroundMay for shutdown season, which
makes us all think, well, theymust not have any work out there
.
Speaker 2 (03:16):
But that's not true, is it?
No, it's not.
And I know when I was goingthrough school the entire idea
was oh, I'm gonna go out westand make money.
Oh, I'm gonna go to Ontario andmake money.
I didn't know there was so muchjob opportunity here.
You just kind of gotta get yourfoot in the door and look for
it, and once you make a goodname for yourself, it's pretty
easy to find some work yeah,everyone's that I've talked to
has basically said that they'venever had problems finding work.
(03:38):
Actually, no, no, no.
Yeah, you can bounce aroundhere.
We got the refinery here forindustrial work you can start
doing.
I worked at a couple offabrication shops.
You can bounce around at themills and stuff, like once you
get going you can kind of youcan find some good work.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
Now the program you took with the welding
engineering tech program, theWET program.
That's something that's notoffered everywhere in Canada.
No, it's not so it's out herein the Maritimes and not all of
the provinces in a couple ormaybe even just in New Brunswick
.
Speaker 2 (04:06):
I think it's just in New Brunswick.
Well, they have one program inNewfoundland and they have one
program at the NBCC in Moncton,In Moncton, right.
Speaker 1 (04:15):
And then, aside from that, it's Ontario and Alberta,
and that's about it.
I mean, I'm in Saskatchewan, wedon and we don't have that
program and every time I meetsomeone who's gone through that
program from any of theprovinces, it really seems like
a great program.
Talk to me about your programthat you took here, and what was
it about?
Speaker 2 (04:33):
Yeah, I took the program in Moncton that's where
I'm originally from.
So I took that program rightout of high school and I clicked
in it pretty much right off thebat, like I really wanted to
get into welding.
But I really wanted to find out, like the the why and the
science behind welding as well.
So that's why I took the weld,the weld tech program, because
(04:53):
we started out doing somewelding and then in the second
year we really dive into theinspection, inspection parts of
it and the how everything kindof works right yeah, the
metallurgy, the background of it, yes exactly.
So, yeah, I I really enjoyed theprogram.
I still have really greatrelations with all the
instructors and you know, if Iever need anything they're
always there for me, and great,yeah, now why welding at all I?
Speaker 3 (05:16):
mean you know.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
You know, for for someone coming up in in new
brunswick there's probably lotsof opportunities in different
areas you're like.
I mean the fisheries and themarine life out here is
something in itself.
You know why.
What attracted you to get intothe welding trade?
You said you wanted to get intoit right at high school.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
Yeah, so when I was in high school, I've always been
interested in working on cars,working on older vehicles, and
it was just something I wasbrought up around.
So when I was in high school, Istarted taking automotive
classes as soon as I could andwhen.
I started doing that.
We started doing um some autobody work, so just repairing
panels or basic welding and Ifell in love with it right off
the bat.
(05:51):
I wanted to do the skills,competition and everything it
was it was pretty cool did youdo skills for auto body.
No, I didn't.
I didn't end up doing it.
Speaker 1 (05:58):
I wasn't good enough, but you wanted to.
Yeah, I wanted to.
Speaker 3 (06:02):
I was just starting.
Speaker 2 (06:03):
I didn't really understand anything about
welding.
It was just kind of like a coolconcept to me and I really I
really liked it.
So when I was in my automotiveclass I I really kind of put my
mind to starting welding afterschool.
I wanted to take the weldingprogram and it was actually my
um, my instructor in high schoolthat said maybe you should take
like the weld tech program.
Like I I know, somebody who'staken that and they're doing
(06:25):
really well for themselves.
It's a two-year program, soit's a little bit longer, but
you kind of understand, like thethe why things work, how things
work.
Um, you get to know everything.
It's easier to problem solve, Iguess, when, when you're
welding, and you know what'sgoing on, why you're getting
these issues, you know or notgetting the product that you
want.
So I kind of looked into that.
I went to the open house forthe uh, the weld tech program
(06:49):
and, uh, yeah, I just it justkind of clicked and so I signed
up and got in why weld tech andnot just welding?
Speaker 3 (06:57):
you know if you were looking to just do the.
Speaker 1 (06:59):
If you fell in love with welding, was there
something that you looked atboth the programs and thought
this one looks cooler than thatone?
Speaker 2 (07:05):
Well, yeah, like I said, I kind of just wanted to
know like the why behind it andI really liked kind of being in
the lab and those kinds ofthings.
Those interested me as well.
And my entire time that I wasin the welding technology
program I was like I'm justgoing to go out and be a welder,
that's, I didn't want to be aninspector.
I kind of saw it as like youknow you shouldn't coach a sport
(07:29):
you don't play right.
So I was like I want to be awelder, I want to do that.
So every chance that I got, Iwas like trying to get jobs at
fab shops or or working whereveryou know practicing at home all
the time, you know.
Um, so I did that and uh yeah,but basically I took the course
because I wanted to understandthe science behind it.
I kind of you know that showhow it's made yeah, whatever, I
love that as a kid.
Everyone loves that yeah, so itwas kind of like that, but in
the course really awesome.
Speaker 1 (07:50):
Well, I know that you know.
I taught welding for a longtime and lots of the students
would be like why do we need tolearn metallurgy?
What's the point of learningmetallurgy?
Right, and I was like you knowyou can go a long way in your
career without learningmetallurgy, but it's the
ultimate problem solver.
Speaker 2 (08:06):
Yes, exactly.
Speaker 1 (08:06):
Because you're not going to ever really figure out
what's wrong with your weld orwhat's happening unless you know
metallurgy, because otherwiseyou're just turning knobs right.
It's just like oh, more voltage, less voltage, more this, more
that, less that.
And it isn't until you actuallyunderstand the metallurgy,
what's happening in the weld,that you can just look at it and
be like okay, it's probablythis or that or this, because
(08:28):
you can start to problem solveright.
Speaker 2 (08:30):
Yes, exactly, and that's exactly why I wanted to
take the course too, like I hadwent to the open house and kind
of asked those questions to theinstructors and they were like,
yeah, we deep dive intoeverything that goes on in
welding, like why things happen,why you're getting the results
you want or don't want, and Ireally liked that.
I thought I'd learn a lot moreum that way.
So that's just the route that Ichose to take and you said it
(08:52):
was a two-year course, right?
Speaker 1 (08:53):
yes because I know some of the wet programs in
Canada are sometimes three.
Now yeah right now it's it'll.
Sometimes they've added I thinksome of them have added
robotics or automation to a fewof them yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:03):
So it's supposed to be a three-year course and they
condense it into a two-yearcourse, so we kind of do like a
sped up version at the mbcc inmonkton.
Um, I know their theirintentions behind that is to
basically just make it so thatyou kind of you feel that
pressure that you'd feel in theindustry, like when I'm working
at a job.
(09:23):
It's like it's very high pace,need things now.
You need to be thinking likethree steps ahead.
Speaker 1 (09:28):
You're the one holding up the job Exactly.
Speaker 2 (09:30):
And they want to simulate that in the course,
right?
So everything is like that,like you're staying up really
late to finish projects that aredue the next morning, and then
you're repeat doing that allagain.
Right, so it was very stressfulbut I appreciated the stress,
the it was very stressful, but Iappreciated the stress, the
simulation of that, becausethat's what I do every day in my
job.
Now, right, so, you can't makeit in the course.
Probably you know wouldn't doas good in the industry.
Speaker 1 (09:53):
Now you said you tried to avoid becoming an
inspector, but then it happened.
Speaker 2 (10:07):
Yes, it did.
Yeah, yeah, my entireintentions behind the course.
I was like like I'm gonna, I,immediately when we finish the
course, we have the opportunityto take the cw1, a cwb level one
exam, the welding exam.
Um, so we, I took that rightout right off the bat.
Um past that and then Iimmediately went back for my
work term.
I worked at a small fabricationshop in monkcton called
McSheffries, so I worked there.
They ended up offering me a job.
(10:27):
I took that for the summer andI got a call from a shop in St
John saying that they werelooking for inspectors and they
wanted to hire me.
And it was.
It was a little bit more moneyand I honestly was like you know
what, maybe I should just diveinto this.
Yeah, and I can always fallback on welding.
Maybe I should just dive intothis right, yeah, and.
I can always fall back onwelding if I wanted to.
But, um, I wanted to trysomething else.
(10:49):
I kind of I was born and raisedin Moncton kind of wanted to
move out of my hometown too, soit was kind of an opportunity to
to do it, so I just jumped onit, I guess yeah, and how?
Speaker 1 (10:59):
how's the transition been?
Have you enjoyed it?
Speaker 2 (11:01):
actually, yeah, I enjoyed it a lot.
So I started out, um, when Ifirst got to the company that I
was working for in st john's cfm, I was doing just nde, so we
did like small shutdowns at themills or I was traveling back
and forth to uh differentcompanies.
We went to cavendish farms anduh pei, just doing small
inspections like uh utinspections, mag, particle
(11:23):
inspections, stuff like that,and I did a little bit of
radiography, liquid penetrant,all all those kinds of welding
or inspections yeah yeah, so, um, I did that and then, uh, it
came around the slower seasonfor us, so it's winter, so I
took a little bit of time off todo some courses and then they
basically told me that I had anopportunity to go to the
(11:45):
refinery to do some qualitycontrol inspections.
So I jumped onto that and thenI've been there ever since and
that's what I do now QC, qualitycontrol inspections.
So, and I love that, I lovegoing to work.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
Actually it's pretty, pretty cool, well you know,
when I came in yesterday on theflight, it was like one in the
morning.
I was flying into St John andthe taxi driver taking me to the
hotel, and I saw you on theflight.
It was like one in the morning.
I was flying into St John andthe taxi driver taking me to the
hotel and I saw the refinery.
I could see the glow of therefinery from the airport and
I'm from Regina.
We have a refinery too, andit's big work right.
And anywhere there's a refinery,there's a lot of work attached
(12:17):
to it, especially for thewelding community.
We just actually had a blowoutin Regina at our refinery last
month.
Oh, really it's pretty scary,but no one got killed, which was
nice.
But it just goes to show likerefineries are a constant state
of repair.
Speaker 2 (12:34):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 1 (12:34):
Like constant.
People don't realize the wearand tear high-pressure piping
has on it, especially when yougo from summers to winters and
winters back to summers.
Everything's outside,everything's.
You know, there's thousands andthousands of kilometers of
piping in these refineries and Ilearned today that it's one of
the largest refineries in Canada.
Speaker 2 (12:56):
In Canada?
Yeah, I think in North Americatoo.
I might be wrong, but yeah itis.
It's a big place and it's a lotto maintain.
We have 24-7 coverage.
No-transcript.
(13:25):
Oh, is that?
Is that uptown?
Is that the city?
And she said, no, that's therefinery it's like I was so
blown away.
Speaker 1 (13:30):
It was huge, right, yeah, yeah now.
Do you know what kind of fuelsthey make at the refinery here,
what kind of stuff they do?
Speaker 2 (13:37):
um, I don't uh deep dive into that stuff too much,
but just curious yeah just yeah.
Um, honestly, I would probablybe misquoting if I told you.
Speaker 1 (13:47):
So now, what kind of work do you do there?
Like what's the typical day?
Speaker 2 (13:50):
look like for you at the refinery yeah, so when I
come in, I'll come in in themorning.
Um, we kind of have like ameeting in the morning to see
what jobs are going to be on thego, what repairs.
So I do maintenance right now.
Um, I do turn around sometimesin the fall or in the spring,
whatever's going on, but day today I just do this, the general
maintenance repairs.
So we go in, we have a meetingabout what's going to go on,
(14:12):
what jobs we're working on today, and then we get a work packet.
Basically it's just the entirejob is planned out and you just
kind of make sure thateverybody's following the steps.
Your quality surveillance,quality control make sure the
jobs are running smooth,everything's up to code.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
And yeah, how much or how big of a part of your NDE
job is safety related.
Speaker 2 (14:38):
Um, I just stumped you because that's kind of a
tricky question, because so muchof inspection is related to
safety.
Yes.
Speaker 1 (14:48):
But not directly.
Speaker 2 (14:49):
Right and it's kind of a weird overlap, right yeah.
So right now, with me doing thequality control, I just
organized the NDE, so I'll get,like, the NDE technicians to
come in and do some work for me,I guess, and then they submit a
report basically saying it ifit accepts or if it fails, right
so.
But with high pressure piping,like we have a lot of, there's a
(15:11):
lot of responsibility on you,right, like, like you said, in
that those accidents in regina-like there's stuff that happens
like that all the time atrefineries.
Luckily, at the refinery here wewe've been like safety is our
top priority right so we haven'thad very many issues, but, um
for sure, like I take safety aslike a big, a big thing,
especially with nde, it's alwayslike that thing you fall back
(15:34):
on right like you can weldsomething, you can look at it
and it can look all great, butas soon as you do radiography on
it, you might not be able tosee something that's internally
wrong with it.
Right, so it really can saveyour butt, I mean, you know now.
Speaker 1 (15:48):
You got into the program young like I have here
written down that you.
You took the program at 19years old right, so like yeah,
so I graduated yeah right.
So like you're out in the worldat 19, fresh ticket and you're,
and you're out there to proveyourself.
First of all, that's young foranybody period, but how was that
for you as a young woman to try?
(16:10):
To get out there and be likehey, listen to me, I have a cert
.
I'm going to tell you, your weldfailed.
How do you feel about that?
Yes, exactly.
Speaker 2 (16:18):
No, no for sure, because I mean I have a later
birthday in the year.
So when I graduated high school, I was 17.
And then I later birthday inthe year.
So when I graduated high school, I was 17, and then we, uh, I
did the two-year program.
I graduated 19 and then prettymuch started working right off
the bat, right.
So, um, being a young woman, itwas definitely a little bit
intimidating.
But once you kind of get intoit and develop a relationship
(16:38):
with uh, with the welders or thefitters or the trades people
that you're working with, um,you kind of develop like a trust
or a bond.
You know they know that you'rethere to make sure that they're
they're doing their job rightand to kind of be a second set
of eyes as well.
And you know you, you learn totrust them and learn their tips
and tricks and techniques thatthey use, right.
(16:58):
So, um, I've definitely runinto a couple issues sometimes,
but I mean, in the general gistof it, people are a little bit
questioning at first because,like you said, I'm, I'm young,
I'm a woman, you know so, but um, in general I've had pretty
great experiences.
Speaker 1 (17:13):
Once you develop that trust and relationship with the
trades people do you have otherfemale inspectors in the
company with you that you workat?
Speaker 2 (17:21):
um, currently, right now, there's none, there's just
me.
But when I first started at therefinery, there was two other
girls that I was working withand, yeah, we pretty much we had
only three inspectors at onepoint and we were all three
girls, so I called it the henhouse.
Speaker 1 (17:37):
Where'd they go off to?
Speaker 2 (17:39):
One of them is on maternity leave right now.
And the other one.
She just ended up going outwest to work for a little bit
and now she's working directlyfor Irving at the refinery as
well.
She's just doing a differentinspection position.
Speaker 1 (17:50):
Right right Now in your work, is it very seasonal,
is there a lot of up and downsor is it pretty steady?
Speaker 2 (17:58):
For the maintenance work.
It's steady all year round.
We do have slower seasons,given in the winter and stuff
After a shutdown ends in thefall, we usually have slower
seasons, um, given in the winterand stuff after shutdown ends
in the fall.
We usually have a slower seasonin the winter, but it picks
right back up in the fall.
So people some people do getlaid off in the slower season,
um, but you'll, you'll be pickedright back up after a couple,
couple weeks or a couple monthsdepends what's going on too, how
(18:19):
many projects are on the go atthe refinery and stuff, but it's
a typically it's likeyear-round work now you said you
have people report to you andbring your report, so I would
assume that means you're leveltwo yes, I am so when did you go
back to do your level two andhow was that?
that was, uh, my level two.
It was good.
I went back um, I think it'salmost two years ago, a year and
(18:40):
a half ago now.
Um, I went back as soon as Icould.
You have to develop a certainamount of hours being a level
one, right, and you have to getsomeone to sign off on you, um,
so as soon as I had those hours,I took it.
Yeah, um, just to just to see,and I passed, luckily on the
first time.
Speaker 1 (18:54):
It's tough.
It is a lot harder than thefirst one.
Speaker 2 (18:56):
I agree it was a very challenging exam, but, um, it
was a good refresher to kind ofbe studying for it and uh, you
know, you go take your level oneexam, go out into the industry
and then you kind of forget acouple textbook things right.
So it was a great refresher,but it was definitely a
challenging exam.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
I find that one of the things that's nice about the
inspection exams now, asopposed to a million years ago
when I took them, is that nowit's all on PDFs on computers.
Speaker 2 (19:23):
Yes, yeah.
Speaker 1 (19:23):
So you can actually just use the search function on
pdfs to help you narrow it down.
I don't know if you did that ornot?
Yes, I did, yeah, but it makesit a lot easier to find
something, whereas before you'dliterally have to like remember
where it is in the book, whichsucked yes, when I went to go
take my exam, actually there wasa couple older guys there and
they had a giant binder and theywere flipping through.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
They just had the printed textbook because they
didn't know how to use it on thecomputer and I was like wow,
like that's kind of impressiveto just remember where
everything is yeah, I couldnever do that.
Speaker 1 (19:53):
No, I know, I'm always just like search.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
47 one whatever it'll come up some people have that
kind of photographic memory,though, like I know a couple
guys that I can call them up andthey're like oh yeah, it's that
this paragraph and this code,and you look exactly at this
table.
Speaker 1 (20:08):
Yeah, I wish I was like that yeah, not all of us
are that smart now in terms ofyou know your involvement in the
community.
Do you try to do anything as a,as a mentor, as a female mentor
?
Do you work with women?
Do you ever do anything likethat?
Speaker 2 (20:24):
um, yeah, I mean, I had.
I had great mentors that weremen actually for me when I was
in high school and stuff.
Like I said, my teacher thatwas teaching automotive, he was
a great mentor for me.
He really pushed me to just getinto the industry and not be
afraid to do something with thetrades, to do something right,
(20:47):
yeah, with the trades.
Um, I try to be something likethat for I guess younger women
like getting opportunities likethis to talk on the podcast or
to uh go do the try trade hereat skills canada, you know
anything.
I can kind of get my foot inthe door and kind of be like a
positive light for forespecially younger girls, this
it's.
Speaker 1 (21:00):
It's not something scary, you know, like you yeah
you can do it right well, thetrades is only four percent
women, or you know?
yeah steel trades and it's theworst of all and I bring it up
in a lot of episodes becauseit's always like I love getting
the perspective of what do youthink we could do better in the
industry, because everyone's gota different angle, everyone's
got a different piece of theindustry that they work in right
(21:20):
and and for a long time I thinkwe've we've been working really
hard at recruiting um, but nowit's like what can we do to help
them stay you?
Speaker 2 (21:29):
know, what?
Speaker 1 (21:30):
what is it that we're missing and what can we do
better?
Speaker 2 (21:32):
for sure.
I find that um a lot of peoplebefore they go into the industry
like I've had very manypositive experiences being in
the industry working with umjust men all day or whatever
right like I haven't had very.
I've been fortunate to not havevery many negative experiences I
have heard people have but, um,I think that to get people to
stay into it, it just honestly Ithink it might just develop
(21:55):
over time.
I think people right now arestill a little bit afraid.
Women might be a little bitafraid to uh go into a room and
it's just all men there you'retrying to tell them what to do,
right, like I.
I totally get that, but onceyou get over that stigma, I find
that it's it's not too bad.
Speaker 1 (22:09):
So there's a job that needs to be done.
The job is exactly right right,exactly.
Speaker 2 (22:13):
It doesn't matter who you are like, as long as you're
getting your job done and doingit right so that ties into,
like the atlantic, you know,skills competitions.
Speaker 1 (22:24):
You said you wanted to do skills when you were
younger.
Not good enough.
I don't know if I believe you,but okay, you know.
Okay.
Now, how are you involved inskills since then?
Speaker 2 (22:35):
So my best friend Courtney she runs the Skills
Canada in New Brunswick here.
Speaker 1 (22:39):
So any chance I get Like Courtney Donovan.
Courtney Donovan, yes, yes, yes.
I've known her for a long time.
I was in russia with her.
Speaker 2 (22:45):
Oh really were you yes, yeah, I heard that was a
pretty fun trip it was awesometook a picture with the game of
thrones uh chair and stuff.
Speaker 1 (22:50):
It's pretty cool.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
Yeah, courtney's awesome, she's one of my best
friends, um, so she kind ofhelped me get involved when I
was in college.
That's where I met her.
So we did, um, we did somementorship for young girls
getting into the trades in highschools and stuff.
We'd go around and teach themlike just basic stuff about
setting up a welding machine,running a bead, like just basic
(23:12):
stuff, just to get them involvedand kind of promote them
getting into the shop, gettingtheir hands dirty, right.
So I do that and then anythingelse Courtney kind of asked me
to it's going to photo op overthere.
Speaker 1 (23:27):
Yeah right, crazy, yeah, uh, anything else,
courtney kind of asked me to um.
Speaker 2 (23:29):
Yeah, anything else Courtney pretty much gets me to
uh, um, get into like coming outhere doing the tri trade or
we're doing any judging fortheir welding competitions and
stuff.
I try to be involved that way,Awesome.
Speaker 1 (23:42):
Well, let's take a quick break here for our, for
our advertisers, and then whenwe get back, I want to talk more
about skills, atlantic andwhat's going on here, because I
think it's a wonderful thing topromote the trades and I want to
get your view on a few things.
So don't go anywhere.
We'll be right back here withBella Hicks here on the CWB
Association podcast.
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(25:27):
And we are back here on the cwbassociation podcast.
I'm here with bella hicks atnbcc.
Like I said earlier, we're outhere for the atlantic skills
competition and, uh, you knowwe're a part of the welding
world, we're part of the weldingtrades.
You yourself took a wet programand are a level two inspector
at the upgrader.
What is it that you hope to dothis week?
(25:49):
What's what?
What work are you doing here?
Speaker 2 (25:52):
um.
So, like I said earlier, I'mdoing the tri trade for try to
promote some high school kidsthat's with your company.
Speaker 1 (25:57):
Yes, it's an inspection company.
Yes, exactly, yep um.
Speaker 2 (26:01):
So I'm doing that uh to try to promote some people to
get into the inspections, getinto the trade world, um, and
then I'm also helping out withthe judging for the um welding
competitions, I believe, thisafternoon and then tomorrow as
well, both the post-secondaryand the secondary.
Speaker 1 (26:17):
Yes, yeah, have you judged before?
Speaker 2 (26:19):
I did uh when I was in college.
We had the uh provincialcompetitions at the nvcc monkton
so we just had them for the uhthe welding students there see
who was going to be moving on tothe provincial competitions.
So we did an in-houseinspections and stuff like that
so pretty excited are you pumped?
Speaker 1 (26:35):
I am pretty excited to see what's out there.
You know, what do you?
Which one's easier for you tojudge, the secondary or
post-secondary?
Speaker 2 (26:44):
uh, probably the, the post-secondary I was talking
about it with the ua guysearlier.
Speaker 1 (26:51):
It's like I love the secondary competitions, the high
school kids.
I mean they're, they'readorable, I don't know how else
to say it.
Speaker 2 (26:57):
I love seeing the young welders come up and and
working so hard like I meanthey're, they're trying so hard,
but uh, you could also tellthey're still in high school,
right yeah, I like thepost-secondary too, because,
working in the industry andstuff, this might be somebody
that you run into in the future.
Right so you get to kind of seewhere they're at right now and
maybe you'll meet them five, tenyears down the road or a year
down the road and kind of seelike, oh they're, they're kind
(27:19):
of honing their skills now,right, so one of the things I've
always noticed after years nowof being involved with these
things decades.
Speaker 1 (27:27):
God, I'm old is that even the ones that just show up
to these competitions likeyou're maybe not even going to
place top 10.
But you're here, you're trying,you're competing.
You're already steps ahead ofsomeone who didn't.
You already have an advantagein the industry, steps ahead of
someone who didn't.
You already have an advantagein the industry.
(27:47):
You're probably going to getout there and get a better job
and make more money becauseyou're willing to put your neck
out there.
Speaker 2 (27:51):
Yes, for sure, I think that goes a long way just
to, like you said, put yourselfout there.
It definitely gives you thatkind of advantage in just your
attitude and your work ethic.
I find Right.
Speaker 3 (28:02):
Yeah, I tried to do the in-house competition and it
didn't in just like yourattitude and your work ethic.
Speaker 2 (28:05):
I find you know right .
Yeah, I uh, I took the.
I tried to do like the in-houseand or the in-house um
competition when I was in highschool, just with the welding
students.
Some of the weld tech studentsdid the welding as well yeah I'd
been practicing for weeks,weeks and then when I got there,
it just, it just didn't turnout the way I wanted it to, so I
didn't end up moving on.
But, um, anyway, I did that,but it was just looking back on
(28:25):
it.
It was just like the, themindset, just to go and try
something and, and you know, putyourself out there.
Speaker 1 (28:30):
So what are the things that you know you need
for these types of things,because this is a competition
right Is that competitive spirit, that desire to win and to
compete against other people andsee where you are.
You know how important have youseen that be in your career.
You know, when you're out inthe workplace, when you're out
in the field, that competitivespirit amongst welders.
Speaker 2 (28:52):
For sure, I think it's.
There's a very big competitivecompetitiveness with welders for
sure, because I mean you'regetting into an industry and
there's thousands and thousandsof other people that are kind of
like you know could be a lotbetter than you, could be a lot
worse than you, whatever.
So I think it's really importantto kind of have that
competitive edge, especially asan apprentice, like practicing
(29:14):
at home, taking your days offand maybe going to your welding
hall if you're in the union andpracticing and kind of.
You know, just if you have thatcompetitive edge, you just
might be a little bit betterthan than the next guy and you
might end up keeping your jobright so I think I think it kind
of ultimately comes down tothat and what about as an
inspector?
Speaker 1 (29:35):
do you find that it changes much?
Speaker 2 (29:38):
for for the competitiveness?
Speaker 1 (29:39):
do you try to be a better inspector than the
inspectors around you?
Are you trying to out-inspectthem?
Speaker 2 (29:49):
Yeah, I definitely do try to put myself there as
having good work ethic.
It's always just been like apride thing for me, like I just
don't like leaving somethingunfinished or doing something
half I guess, yeah, better orworse, but so I don't know I I I
guess there's not as muchcompetition as like in the
welding industry, I guess, forthat way.
(30:09):
But um, I'm not trying to outinspect anybody but how many
inspections have you done today?
I did 24, you know it's not moreso about that.
It's more so just about likehaving tidy work, making sure
that.
Speaker 1 (30:23):
Clean documentation, Exactly right.
Speaker 2 (30:24):
Like, if you're doing a package and you have
everything organized, if thenext guy picks it up, he should
know exactly where you left offright, not leaving everything in
a mess and just taking pride inyour work honestly.
Speaker 1 (30:34):
And where do you see yourself going with your
inspection game?
You know you went from levelone to level two.
Do you see a level three inyour future?
Not a lot of people go that far.
Speaker 2 (30:44):
Yeah, um, I really don't know.
I'm just, I'm uh, I'd like todo a couple api tickets okay,
I'm six year, 650s.
Yeah, yeah, and it depends whereI end up going.
Um, I really like my job at therefinery right now doing like
the maintenance gig and doingthe turnarounds and stuff, so I
stick around here.
Yeah, I might look into doingmy CWB Level 3.
I think that could be in thenear future, but I don't know.
(31:07):
If I travel around, bouncearound, I could look at doing
different other avenues gettingsome API tickets, maybe doing a
couple other code endorsementswith CWB, like your ASMEs,
exactly right.
Speaker 1 (31:15):
Or your B51s.
Yeah, although I heard there'ssome issues.
There's some pushback on thenew 51 updates.
Speaker 3 (31:21):
Oh, really yeah.
Speaker 2 (31:23):
Interesting.
Speaker 1 (31:23):
Every time there's code updates there's always some
.
It trickles down over time.
Speaker 2 (31:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (31:28):
But I mean, there's a lot of different codes out
there, you know out here.
Speaker 2 (31:38):
I don't know, does Lloyd's still push around here
for shipbuilding?
There's not as muchshipbuilding around here because
they shut down the shipyardhere.
But there definitely might bein Halifax, where they have a
big shipyard there, you knowyeah.
Speaker 1 (31:47):
I've been out to those Halifax shipyards.
They're cool.
Speaker 2 (31:49):
Yeah, they are yeah, but I mean, Irving is everywhere
out here right.
Speaker 1 (31:52):
Like even the gas station's everywhere I was like
I always forget how big of acompany Irving is until I'm back
out here.
Speaker 2 (32:02):
It's almost as popular as the Tim.
Speaker 1 (32:03):
Hortons on every corner here.
Yeah, but hopefully they'rebetter, because I don't like Tim
Hortons coffee very much.
Speaker 2 (32:06):
Yeah, more McDonald's coffee.
I am more of a McDonald'scoffee.
Speaker 1 (32:11):
Sorry, we're not sponsored by either of those
companies.
But I mean, if McDonald's wantsto sponsor yo, we're here.
Speaker 2 (32:18):
I'll take the free coffee, yeah.
Speaker 3 (32:18):
I'll take the free coffee for sure.
Speaker 1 (32:21):
So if you're not looking to get that level three,
you know, do you see yourselfat the refinery a long time?
You know, are you happy withthe gig?
You're so young.
I'm sure you probably have somethings that you'd like to check
off the bucket list.
Speaker 2 (32:34):
Oh yeah, there's definitely like a bucket list of
things I'd like to do, but Ireally it's from talking to
other inspectors and tradesmenwho've traveled and stuff like
it's really, you're reallyfortunate to work like 40 hours
a week and come home every night.
You know there's not as muchtraveling and stress financially
like when's the next shutdown,kind of thing.
So I get a lot of overtime,don't get me wrong.
(32:59):
But if I wanted to just workthe 40 hours a week and go home
every night and have my weekendsoff like I'm, and you're making
a decent living exactly right.
Speaker 1 (33:04):
I mean, overtime's always nice for welders because
it's extra money, but it's scarywhen you need overtime to
survive.
That's not what you want.
You want your normal 40 tocover life.
Yep, anything above and beyondis above and beyond right.
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (33:19):
Yeah, so I'm really fortunate to have something
local that kind of I'm able todo that, so I could see myself
staying there for a while.
But I mean if anything happens,I'd love to travel and bounce
around.
Speaker 1 (33:30):
Have you done any traveling?
Have you gone anywhere else?
Speaker 2 (33:32):
Not to work.
No, I mean, I've gone tosmaller other Atlantic provinces
.
I have Nova Scotia or PEI to dothe odd like NDE job or
whatever, but um, no, bigtraveling not yet not yet you're
open to it oh yeah, I'mdefinitely open to it what about
for your hobbies?
Speaker 1 (33:49):
is there anything that you do?
Because I mean, just thismorning, you know, we
interviewed someone, sarah, andshe does.
You know, metal art and there'sso much awesome.
I love Sarah Thornton.
Yeah, and it's something thatI've never really gotten into.
But you know, I've always foundit so interesting that people
that are in the weldingcommunity also are often so
creative.
They have a creative side tothem, and maybe I'm just the
(34:10):
weird one that doesn't have thatvery well, but you know, are
you also in that, in that bucketwhere you?
Speaker 2 (34:16):
you have a creative side, oh yeah, for sure, like I
mean, I uh, I play a coupleinstruments.
I play guitar, I play piano.
Speaker 1 (34:21):
Does that count, because I play instruments?
Yeah, that's, that's a creativeside creative outlet for sure,
yeah, cool yeah, so um, yeah,but you're definitely right.
Speaker 2 (34:29):
I find that a lot of creative people get into welding
.
It's almost like like you said,sarah, doing like the metal art
on the side.
That's's a really big thing inour industry too, and I've
noticed that a lot.
I find creative people oftenhave like steady hands too,
either from playing instrumentsor drawing or painting, or
whatever.
Speaker 1 (34:44):
And patience for sure .
Yeah, that's the thing thatmakes a good welder Art makes
you patient, because you know,trying to learn that song on
guitar man, sometimes you justwant to throw that thing out the
window.
Speaker 2 (34:54):
Yeah, I've been there Definitely smashed a few
guitars over songs.
Speaker 1 (34:59):
Over sad songs, over romantic songs, over broken
hearts.
Speaker 2 (35:02):
Pretty angry songs.
Speaker 1 (35:05):
And what about cars?
You know, you said you lovedcars, you grew up around cars.
Yes, oh my gosh, I'm a car guy.
Speaker 2 (35:10):
I've had over 30 vehicles my whole life, I love
vehicles, I love, I can't I'vebeen waiting to pull my cars out
of storage right now, but it'sstill snowing in Saskatchewan,
so oh, really, yeah, I just tookmine out of storage.
Actually, I, uh, I have threevehicles right now.
I just bought a new truck Well,it's new to me, it's an older
truck.
Speaker 3 (35:28):
It's a 75 Ford.
Speaker 2 (35:40):
Um, I just bring it out here, actually, but my
starter just went so and uh, 75ford, it's a f100.
F100, so that's 302 or it has a390 in it 390.
Speaker 1 (35:44):
Oh, that's a great engine.
Yeah, heavy and low, but it's.
It's good, sounds pretty good.
But that starter is going tohave a separate bend x on it.
It's all a solenoid it'll be,uh, yeah.
Speaker 2 (35:52):
So I mean that's, that's good.
Yeah, something I'll probablyget into tonight and end up
working really late on.
Speaker 1 (35:58):
I got a 2019 Mustang Roush.
Speaker 2 (36:02):
Oh, do you.
Speaker 1 (36:02):
Yeah, which is pretty fun.
But I love all cars.
I've had all the makes, all thebrands.
I'm not like a Chevy guy ornothing like that.
Speaker 2 (36:10):
Yeah, neither am I.
Because they're all fun, theyall got their own little quirks
to them that are cool.
Yeah, totally.
I got a couple gmcs too, andthen I have this.
This is my first ford, but Imean, I'm not, I'm not a brand
person either.
Yeah, yeah, like I have a chevytruck and a ford mustang, so
whatever I kind of consider,like if you're into the cars too
, like that's kind of like anartsy side to you like I feel
like vehicles are art right yeah, I used to.
Speaker 1 (36:31):
I used to like customize it.
When I was younger I was reallybig into like dropping them
down, lowering them, big stereos, all that cool stuff.
But I mean, it's one of theluxuries that you can have as a
welder, because you can affordhobbies like that yes, exactly
right, it's one of the things Ialways tell young people about
getting into the trades,especially women, because when
you look at the, the list insociety of like things that make
(36:55):
life difficult, economicsecurity, financial security, is
like number one yeah, rightbecause if you can't afford to
live, you're not dreaming,you're not thinking about the
future, you're not thinkingabout hobbies, you're not
thinking about art, you know,you're not thinking about these
things, you're just thinkingabout surviving.
And the trades give you thatluxury, afford you the luxury
(37:17):
that hard work will allow you togo buy a 1975 ford 100 and make
it a project vehicle.
Why?
Speaker 2 (37:23):
because you can yeah, right, and that's fun, that's
great yeah, I definitely havebeen really fortunate, like
getting into into the trades youdo work.
You work long hours.
You're going to miss out on onfamily events and holidays and
stuff like that sometimes.
But, um, I've been reallyfortunate Like I'm only 24 right
now.
I just bought my first house inNovember and it's been kind of
like a crazy time for housingand stuff like that, yeah,
(37:45):
that's wild, right.
Speaker 1 (37:46):
So many 24-year-olds are struggling around the world
right now.
Speaker 2 (37:50):
Yeah, exactly.
So I mean, it's kind of crazy,I guess.
But yeah, yeah, I've beenpretty fortunate enough to to
have a job that that lets me dothat and uh, the trades are
definitely it if you want tohave some financial security
yeah, I mean, I don't know,fortunate's the word.
You're hard working that istrue, you build your own luck,
you know.
Speaker 1 (38:09):
I mean, you know you say you got to be good to be
lucky and lucky to be good,right, yeah, so it's.
Uh.
It's one of those things wherewe try to tell people and like
you said it best yes, there'shard days, work, you might miss
birthdays, you might misswhatever's, but what do you gain
?
Right?
Like you gain so much on theback side right yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (38:30):
No, I totally agree so what's next?
Speaker 1 (38:32):
uh, for this week, you know, you got the judging
today, judging tomorrow, you gotthe booth, and then that's it.
Back home, then back to work onMonday.
Speaker 2 (38:42):
Yeah, pretty much.
Yeah, the dream is over, thedream is over.
Yeah, yeah, I don't got muchelse on the go, honestly.
Speaker 1 (38:48):
Yeah, awesome.
Well, I hope we have time to goout and see all the judging
later.
I know we want to take picturesand talk to the competitors too
.
I think we might actually havetime here right away at
lunchtime.
But thanks so much for comingon the show.
It's been lots of fun.
I learned lots today.
I learned about New Brunswickand I can't wait to hopefully
see you guys out in Regina tocome out to Skills.
Speaker 2 (39:10):
Oh, yeah, for sure I'd love to come out.
Speaker 1 (39:12):
Yeah, it'll be a good time.
Awesome.
Thanks, max yeah, you bet.
And for all the people thathave been following along,
thanks so much for being a partof the podcast.
Remember to download, share andalso our fan mail feature.
You know we're collecting allthese fan mails that we're
getting, cause we're going tostart doing them in reels.
We've got a plan.
Trust me, the ones you've beenKeep sending us information.
(39:39):
We love to hear it and we'llcatch you at the next one.
We hope you enjoy the show.
Speaker 3 (39:50):
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All right, I can check.
Check, I'm good.
So I'm Max Duran.
Max Duran, cwb AssociationWelding Podcast, pod pod podcast
.
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Happy welding.
Hello and welcome to anotheredition of the CWB Association
podcast Today.
I am in beautiful New Brunswickand St John.
(01:08):
Here for today's skillscompetition no-transcript.
(01:33):
So first of all, I love yourname, Bella.
Speaker 2 (01:35):
Thank you.
I'm sure you hear that all thetime I do.
I also get that's my dog's namea lot.
Well, I do have friends who'salso but my name's Max.
Speaker 1 (01:46):
so I get that a lot too.
Yeah, probably Bella meansbeautiful in Italian, right it
does Bella yeah.
Yeah, see there my Italianco-editor, podcast manager here.
All right, so let's start withwhat you're doing out here at
NBCC today.
What brought you out here?
Speaker 2 (02:05):
Yeah, I'm out here with a company that I'm working
for right now, cam.
I'm located at the St JohnRefinery.
Right now I'm doing weldinginspections.
So they wanted someone fromindustry to come out kind of
represent what they're doing.
So I'm just I set up a boothfor a tri-trade for some younger
high school kids to come outand try it out.
So we have some uh littlespecimens set up.
(02:27):
they can come try looking at,well, measuring stuff kind of
what we do on a daily basis, andI got a little questionnaire
set up for them.
Yeah, trying to recruit thenext uh generation of of
inspectors yeah, yeah, trying toget people to stay here and get
some jobs in New Brunswick, youknow.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
Well, that's what we've been talking about.
You know it came up as a topica few times.
Is the work in New Brunswickright?
The rest of Canada kind of hasthis idea that there isn't work
out in the Maritimes.
Speaker 2 (02:56):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (02:57):
You know, because we typically see all the people in
the Maritimes.
The tradespeople come outduring shutdown season out west
yeah all the people in theMaritimes, the tradespeople come
out during shutdown season.
Out west it's a very commontheme that we get people from
Nova Scotia, new Brunswick,newfoundland, pei showing up in
Alberta and Saskatchewan aroundMay for shutdown season, which
makes us all think, well, theymust not have any work out there
.
Speaker 2 (03:16):
But that's not true, is it?
No, it's not.
And I know when I was goingthrough school the entire idea
was oh, I'm gonna go out westand make money.
Oh, I'm gonna go to Ontario andmake money.
I didn't know there was so muchjob opportunity here.
You just kind of gotta get yourfoot in the door and look for
it, and once you make a goodname for yourself, it's pretty
easy to find some work yeah,everyone's that I've talked to
has basically said that they'venever had problems finding work.
(03:38):
Actually, no, no, no.
Yeah, you can bounce aroundhere.
We got the refinery here forindustrial work you can start
doing.
I worked at a couple offabrication shops.
You can bounce around at themills and stuff, like once you
get going you can kind of youcan find some good work.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
Now the program you took with the welding
engineering tech program, theWET program.
That's something that's notoffered everywhere in Canada.
No, it's not so it's out herein the Maritimes and not all of
the provinces in a couple ormaybe even just in New Brunswick
.
Speaker 2 (04:06):
I think it's just in New Brunswick.
Well, they have one program inNewfoundland and they have one
program at the NBCC in Moncton,In Moncton, right.
Speaker 1 (04:15):
And then, aside from that, it's Ontario and Alberta,
and that's about it.
I mean, I'm in Saskatchewan, wedon and we don't have that
program and every time I meetsomeone who's gone through that
program from any of theprovinces, it really seems like
a great program.
Talk to me about your programthat you took here, and what was
it about?
Speaker 2 (04:33):
Yeah, I took the program in Moncton that's where
I'm originally from.
So I took that program rightout of high school and I clicked
in it pretty much right off thebat, like I really wanted to
get into welding.
But I really wanted to find out, like the the why and the
science behind welding as well.
So that's why I took the weld,the weld tech program, because
(04:53):
we started out doing somewelding and then in the second
year we really dive into theinspection, inspection parts of
it and the how everything kindof works right yeah, the
metallurgy, the background of it, yes exactly.
So, yeah, I I really enjoyed theprogram.
I still have really greatrelations with all the
instructors and you know, if Iever need anything they're
always there for me, and great,yeah, now why welding at all I?
Speaker 3 (05:16):
mean you know.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
You know, for for someone coming up in in new
brunswick there's probably lotsof opportunities in different
areas you're like.
I mean the fisheries and themarine life out here is
something in itself.
You know why.
What attracted you to get intothe welding trade?
You said you wanted to get intoit right at high school.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
Yeah, so when I was in high school, I've always been
interested in working on cars,working on older vehicles, and
it was just something I wasbrought up around.
So when I was in high school, Istarted taking automotive
classes as soon as I could andwhen.
I started doing that.
We started doing um some autobody work, so just repairing
panels or basic welding and Ifell in love with it right off
the bat.
(05:51):
I wanted to do the skills,competition and everything it
was it was pretty cool did youdo skills for auto body.
No, I didn't.
I didn't end up doing it.
Speaker 1 (05:58):
I wasn't good enough, but you wanted to.
Yeah, I wanted to.
Speaker 3 (06:02):
I was just starting.
Speaker 2 (06:03):
I didn't really understand anything about
welding.
It was just kind of like a coolconcept to me and I really I
really liked it.
So when I was in my automotiveclass I I really kind of put my
mind to starting welding afterschool.
I wanted to take the weldingprogram and it was actually my
um, my instructor in high schoolthat said maybe you should take
like the weld tech program.
Like I I know, somebody who'staken that and they're doing
(06:25):
really well for themselves.
It's a two-year program, soit's a little bit longer, but
you kind of understand, like thethe why things work, how things
work.
Um, you get to know everything.
It's easier to problem solve, Iguess, when, when you're
welding, and you know what'sgoing on, why you're getting
these issues, you know or notgetting the product that you
want.
So I kind of looked into that.
I went to the open house forthe uh, the weld tech program
(06:49):
and, uh, yeah, I just it justkind of clicked and so I signed
up and got in why weld tech andnot just welding?
Speaker 3 (06:57):
you know if you were looking to just do the.
Speaker 1 (06:59):
If you fell in love with welding, was there
something that you looked atboth the programs and thought
this one looks cooler than thatone?
Speaker 2 (07:05):
Well, yeah, like I said, I kind of just wanted to
know like the why behind it andI really liked kind of being in
the lab and those kinds ofthings.
Those interested me as well.
And my entire time that I wasin the welding technology
program I was like I'm justgoing to go out and be a welder,
that's, I didn't want to be aninspector.
I kind of saw it as like youknow you shouldn't coach a sport
(07:29):
you don't play right.
So I was like I want to be awelder, I want to do that.
So every chance that I got, Iwas like trying to get jobs at
fab shops or or working whereveryou know practicing at home all
the time, you know.
Um, so I did that and uh yeah,but basically I took the course
because I wanted to understandthe science behind it.
I kind of you know that showhow it's made yeah, whatever, I
love that as a kid.
Everyone loves that yeah, so itwas kind of like that, but in
the course really awesome.
Speaker 1 (07:50):
Well, I know that you know.
I taught welding for a longtime and lots of the students
would be like why do we need tolearn metallurgy?
What's the point of learningmetallurgy?
Right, and I was like you knowyou can go a long way in your
career without learningmetallurgy, but it's the
ultimate problem solver.
Speaker 2 (08:06):
Yes, exactly.
Speaker 1 (08:06):
Because you're not going to ever really figure out
what's wrong with your weld orwhat's happening unless you know
metallurgy, because otherwiseyou're just turning knobs right.
It's just like oh, more voltage, less voltage, more this, more
that, less that.
And it isn't until you actuallyunderstand the metallurgy,
what's happening in the weld,that you can just look at it and
be like okay, it's probablythis or that or this, because
(08:28):
you can start to problem solveright.
Speaker 2 (08:30):
Yes, exactly, and that's exactly why I wanted to
take the course too, like I hadwent to the open house and kind
of asked those questions to theinstructors and they were like,
yeah, we deep dive intoeverything that goes on in
welding, like why things happen,why you're getting the results
you want or don't want, and Ireally liked that.
I thought I'd learn a lot moreum that way.
So that's just the route that Ichose to take and you said it
(08:52):
was a two-year course, right?
Speaker 1 (08:53):
yes because I know some of the wet programs in
Canada are sometimes three.
Now yeah right now it's it'll.
Sometimes they've added I thinksome of them have added
robotics or automation to a fewof them yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:03):
So it's supposed to be a three-year course and they
condense it into a two-yearcourse, so we kind of do like a
sped up version at the mbcc inmonkton.
Um, I know their theirintentions behind that is to
basically just make it so thatyou kind of you feel that
pressure that you'd feel in theindustry, like when I'm working
at a job.
(09:23):
It's like it's very high pace,need things now.
You need to be thinking likethree steps ahead.
Speaker 1 (09:28):
You're the one holding up the job Exactly.
Speaker 2 (09:30):
And they want to simulate that in the course,
right?
So everything is like that,like you're staying up really
late to finish projects that aredue the next morning, and then
you're repeat doing that allagain.
Right, so it was very stressfulbut I appreciated the stress,
the it was very stressful, but Iappreciated the stress, the
simulation of that, becausethat's what I do every day in my
job.
Now, right, so, you can't makeit in the course.
Probably you know wouldn't doas good in the industry.
Speaker 1 (09:53):
Now you said you tried to avoid becoming an
inspector, but then it happened.
Speaker 2 (10:07):
Yes, it did.
Yeah, yeah, my entireintentions behind the course.
I was like like I'm gonna, I,immediately when we finish the
course, we have the opportunityto take the cw1, a cwb level one
exam, the welding exam.
Um, so we, I took that rightout right off the bat.
Um past that and then Iimmediately went back for my
work term.
I worked at a small fabricationshop in monkcton called
McSheffries, so I worked there.
They ended up offering me a job.
(10:27):
I took that for the summer andI got a call from a shop in St
John saying that they werelooking for inspectors and they
wanted to hire me.
And it was.
It was a little bit more moneyand I honestly was like you know
what, maybe I should just diveinto this.
Yeah, and I can always fallback on welding.
Maybe I should just dive intothis right, yeah, and.
I can always fall back onwelding if I wanted to.
But, um, I wanted to trysomething else.
(10:49):
I kind of I was born and raisedin Moncton kind of wanted to
move out of my hometown too, soit was kind of an opportunity to
to do it, so I just jumped onit, I guess yeah, and how?
Speaker 1 (10:59):
how's the transition been?
Have you enjoyed it?
Speaker 2 (11:01):
actually, yeah, I enjoyed it a lot.
So I started out, um, when Ifirst got to the company that I
was working for in st john's cfm, I was doing just nde, so we
did like small shutdowns at themills or I was traveling back
and forth to uh differentcompanies.
We went to cavendish farms anduh pei, just doing small
inspections like uh utinspections, mag, particle
(11:23):
inspections, stuff like that,and I did a little bit of
radiography, liquid penetrant,all all those kinds of welding
or inspections yeah yeah, so, um, I did that and then, uh, it
came around the slower seasonfor us, so it's winter, so I
took a little bit of time off todo some courses and then they
basically told me that I had anopportunity to go to the
(11:45):
refinery to do some qualitycontrol inspections.
So I jumped onto that and thenI've been there ever since and
that's what I do now QC, qualitycontrol inspections.
So, and I love that, I lovegoing to work.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
Actually it's pretty, pretty cool, well you know,
when I came in yesterday on theflight, it was like one in the
morning.
I was flying into St John andthe taxi driver taking me to the
hotel, and I saw you on theflight.
It was like one in the morning.
I was flying into St John andthe taxi driver taking me to the
hotel and I saw the refinery.
I could see the glow of therefinery from the airport and
I'm from Regina.
We have a refinery too, andit's big work right.
And anywhere there's a refinery,there's a lot of work attached
(12:17):
to it, especially for thewelding community.
We just actually had a blowoutin Regina at our refinery last
month.
Oh, really it's pretty scary,but no one got killed, which was
nice.
But it just goes to show likerefineries are a constant state
of repair.
Speaker 2 (12:34):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 1 (12:34):
Like constant.
People don't realize the wearand tear high-pressure piping
has on it, especially when yougo from summers to winters and
winters back to summers.
Everything's outside,everything's.
You know, there's thousands andthousands of kilometers of
piping in these refineries and Ilearned today that it's one of
the largest refineries in Canada.
Speaker 2 (12:56):
In Canada?
Yeah, I think in North Americatoo.
I might be wrong, but yeah itis.
It's a big place and it's a lotto maintain.
We have 24-7 coverage.
No-transcript.
(13:25):
Oh, is that?
Is that uptown?
Is that the city?
And she said, no, that's therefinery it's like I was so
blown away.
Speaker 1 (13:30):
It was huge, right, yeah, yeah now.
Do you know what kind of fuelsthey make at the refinery here,
what kind of stuff they do?
Speaker 2 (13:37):
um, I don't uh deep dive into that stuff too much,
but just curious yeah just yeah.
Um, honestly, I would probablybe misquoting if I told you.
Speaker 1 (13:47):
So now, what kind of work do you do there?
Like what's the typical day?
Speaker 2 (13:50):
look like for you at the refinery yeah, so when I
come in, I'll come in in themorning.
Um, we kind of have like ameeting in the morning to see
what jobs are going to be on thego, what repairs.
So I do maintenance right now.
Um, I do turn around sometimesin the fall or in the spring,
whatever's going on, but day today I just do this, the general
maintenance repairs.
So we go in, we have a meetingabout what's going to go on,
(14:12):
what jobs we're working on today, and then we get a work packet.
Basically it's just the entirejob is planned out and you just
kind of make sure thateverybody's following the steps.
Your quality surveillance,quality control make sure the
jobs are running smooth,everything's up to code.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
And yeah, how much or how big of a part of your NDE
job is safety related.
Speaker 2 (14:38):
Um, I just stumped you because that's kind of a
tricky question, because so muchof inspection is related to
safety.
Yes.
Speaker 1 (14:48):
But not directly.
Speaker 2 (14:49):
Right and it's kind of a weird overlap, right yeah.
So right now, with me doing thequality control, I just
organized the NDE, so I'll get,like, the NDE technicians to
come in and do some work for me,I guess, and then they submit a
report basically saying it ifit accepts or if it fails, right
so.
But with high pressure piping,like we have a lot of, there's a
(15:11):
lot of responsibility on you,right, like, like you said, in
that those accidents in regina-like there's stuff that happens
like that all the time atrefineries.
Luckily, at the refinery here wewe've been like safety is our
top priority right so we haven'thad very many issues, but, um
for sure, like I take safety aslike a big, a big thing,
especially with nde, it's alwayslike that thing you fall back
(15:34):
on right like you can weldsomething, you can look at it
and it can look all great, butas soon as you do radiography on
it, you might not be able tosee something that's internally
wrong with it.
Right, so it really can saveyour butt, I mean, you know now.
Speaker 1 (15:48):
You got into the program young like I have here
written down that you.
You took the program at 19years old right, so like yeah,
so I graduated yeah right.
So like you're out in the worldat 19, fresh ticket and you're,
and you're out there to proveyourself.
First of all, that's young foranybody period, but how was that
for you as a young woman to try?
(16:10):
To get out there and be likehey, listen to me, I have a cert
.
I'm going to tell you, your weldfailed.
How do you feel about that?
Yes, exactly.
Speaker 2 (16:18):
No, no for sure, because I mean I have a later
birthday in the year.
So when I graduated high school, I was 17.
And then I later birthday inthe year.
So when I graduated high school, I was 17, and then we, uh, I
did the two-year program.
I graduated 19 and then prettymuch started working right off
the bat, right.
So, um, being a young woman, itwas definitely a little bit
intimidating.
But once you kind of get intoit and develop a relationship
(16:38):
with uh, with the welders or thefitters or the trades people
that you're working with, um,you kind of develop like a trust
or a bond.
You know they know that you'rethere to make sure that they're
they're doing their job rightand to kind of be a second set
of eyes as well.
And you know you, you learn totrust them and learn their tips
and tricks and techniques thatthey use, right.
(16:58):
So, um, I've definitely runinto a couple issues sometimes,
but I mean, in the general gistof it, people are a little bit
questioning at first because,like you said, I'm, I'm young,
I'm a woman, you know so, but um, in general I've had pretty
great experiences.
Speaker 1 (17:13):
Once you develop that trust and relationship with the
trades people do you have otherfemale inspectors in the
company with you that you workat?
Speaker 2 (17:21):
um, currently, right now, there's none, there's just
me.
But when I first started at therefinery, there was two other
girls that I was working withand, yeah, we pretty much we had
only three inspectors at onepoint and we were all three
girls, so I called it the henhouse.
Speaker 1 (17:37):
Where'd they go off to?
Speaker 2 (17:39):
One of them is on maternity leave right now.
And the other one.
She just ended up going outwest to work for a little bit
and now she's working directlyfor Irving at the refinery as
well.
She's just doing a differentinspection position.
Speaker 1 (17:50):
Right right Now in your work, is it very seasonal,
is there a lot of up and downsor is it pretty steady?
Speaker 2 (17:58):
For the maintenance work.
It's steady all year round.
We do have slower seasons,given in the winter and stuff
After a shutdown ends in thefall, we usually have slower
seasons, um, given in the winterand stuff after shutdown ends
in the fall.
We usually have a slower seasonin the winter, but it picks
right back up in the fall.
So people some people do getlaid off in the slower season,
um, but you'll, you'll be pickedright back up after a couple,
couple weeks or a couple monthsdepends what's going on too, how
(18:19):
many projects are on the go atthe refinery and stuff, but it's
a typically it's likeyear-round work now you said you
have people report to you andbring your report, so I would
assume that means you're leveltwo yes, I am so when did you go
back to do your level two andhow was that?
that was, uh, my level two.
It was good.
I went back um, I think it'salmost two years ago, a year and
(18:40):
a half ago now.
Um, I went back as soon as Icould.
You have to develop a certainamount of hours being a level
one, right, and you have to getsomeone to sign off on you, um,
so as soon as I had those hours,I took it.
Yeah, um, just to just to see,and I passed, luckily on the
first time.
Speaker 1 (18:54):
It's tough.
It is a lot harder than thefirst one.
Speaker 2 (18:56):
I agree it was a very challenging exam, but, um, it
was a good refresher to kind ofbe studying for it and uh, you
know, you go take your level oneexam, go out into the industry
and then you kind of forget acouple textbook things right.
So it was a great refresher,but it was definitely a
challenging exam.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
I find that one of the things that's nice about the
inspection exams now, asopposed to a million years ago
when I took them, is that nowit's all on PDFs on computers.
Speaker 2 (19:23):
Yes, yeah.
Speaker 1 (19:23):
So you can actually just use the search function on
pdfs to help you narrow it down.
I don't know if you did that ornot?
Yes, I did, yeah, but it makesit a lot easier to find
something, whereas before you'dliterally have to like remember
where it is in the book, whichsucked yes, when I went to go
take my exam, actually there wasa couple older guys there and
they had a giant binder and theywere flipping through.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
They just had the printed textbook because they
didn't know how to use it on thecomputer and I was like wow,
like that's kind of impressiveto just remember where
everything is yeah, I couldnever do that.
Speaker 1 (19:53):
No, I know, I'm always just like search.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
47 one whatever it'll come up some people have that
kind of photographic memory,though, like I know a couple
guys that I can call them up andthey're like oh yeah, it's that
this paragraph and this code,and you look exactly at this
table.
Speaker 1 (20:08):
Yeah, I wish I was like that yeah, not all of us
are that smart now in terms ofyou know your involvement in the
community.
Do you try to do anything as a,as a mentor, as a female mentor
?
Do you work with women?
Do you ever do anything likethat?
Speaker 2 (20:24):
um, yeah, I mean, I had.
I had great mentors that weremen actually for me when I was
in high school and stuff.
Like I said, my teacher thatwas teaching automotive, he was
a great mentor for me.
He really pushed me to just getinto the industry and not be
afraid to do something with thetrades, to do something right,
(20:47):
yeah, with the trades.
Um, I try to be something likethat for I guess younger women
like getting opportunities likethis to talk on the podcast or
to uh go do the try trade hereat skills canada, you know
anything.
I can kind of get my foot inthe door and kind of be like a
positive light for forespecially younger girls, this
it's.
Speaker 1 (21:00):
It's not something scary, you know, like you yeah
you can do it right well, thetrades is only four percent
women, or you know?
yeah steel trades and it's theworst of all and I bring it up
in a lot of episodes becauseit's always like I love getting
the perspective of what do youthink we could do better in the
industry, because everyone's gota different angle, everyone's
got a different piece of theindustry that they work in right
(21:20):
and and for a long time I thinkwe've we've been working really
hard at recruiting um, but nowit's like what can we do to help
them stay you?
Speaker 2 (21:29):
know, what?
Speaker 1 (21:30):
what is it that we're missing and what can we do
better?
Speaker 2 (21:32):
for sure.
I find that um a lot of peoplebefore they go into the industry
like I've had very manypositive experiences being in
the industry working with umjust men all day or whatever
right like I haven't had very.
I've been fortunate to not havevery many negative experiences I
have heard people have but, um,I think that to get people to
stay into it, it just honestly Ithink it might just develop
(21:55):
over time.
I think people right now arestill a little bit afraid.
Women might be a little bitafraid to uh go into a room and
it's just all men there you'retrying to tell them what to do,
right, like I.
I totally get that, but onceyou get over that stigma, I find
that it's it's not too bad.
Speaker 1 (22:09):
So there's a job that needs to be done.
The job is exactly right right,exactly.
Speaker 2 (22:13):
It doesn't matter who you are like, as long as you're
getting your job done and doingit right so that ties into,
like the atlantic, you know,skills competitions.
Speaker 1 (22:24):
You said you wanted to do skills when you were
younger.
Not good enough.
I don't know if I believe you,but okay, you know.
Okay.
Now, how are you involved inskills since then?
Speaker 2 (22:35):
So my best friend Courtney she runs the Skills
Canada in New Brunswick here.
Speaker 1 (22:39):
So any chance I get Like Courtney Donovan.
Courtney Donovan, yes, yes, yes.
I've known her for a long time.
I was in russia with her.
Speaker 2 (22:45):
Oh really were you yes, yeah, I heard that was a
pretty fun trip it was awesometook a picture with the game of
thrones uh chair and stuff.
Speaker 1 (22:50):
It's pretty cool.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
Yeah, courtney's awesome, she's one of my best
friends, um, so she kind ofhelped me get involved when I
was in college.
That's where I met her.
So we did, um, we did somementorship for young girls
getting into the trades in highschools and stuff.
We'd go around and teach themlike just basic stuff about
setting up a welding machine,running a bead, like just basic
(23:12):
stuff, just to get them involvedand kind of promote them
getting into the shop, gettingtheir hands dirty, right.
So I do that and then anythingelse Courtney kind of asked me
to it's going to photo op overthere.
Speaker 1 (23:27):
Yeah right, crazy, yeah, uh, anything else,
courtney kind of asked me to um.
Speaker 2 (23:29):
Yeah, anything else Courtney pretty much gets me to
uh, um, get into like coming outhere doing the tri trade or
we're doing any judging fortheir welding competitions and
stuff.
I try to be involved that way,Awesome.
Speaker 1 (23:42):
Well, let's take a quick break here for our, for
our advertisers, and then whenwe get back, I want to talk more
about skills, atlantic andwhat's going on here, because I
think it's a wonderful thing topromote the trades and I want to
get your view on a few things.
So don't go anywhere.
We'll be right back here withBella Hicks here on the CWB
Association podcast.
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(25:27):
And we are back here on the cwbassociation podcast.
I'm here with bella hicks atnbcc.
Like I said earlier, we're outhere for the atlantic skills
competition and, uh, you knowwe're a part of the welding
world, we're part of the weldingtrades.
You yourself took a wet programand are a level two inspector
at the upgrader.
What is it that you hope to dothis week?
(25:49):
What's what?
What work are you doing here?
Speaker 2 (25:52):
um.
So, like I said earlier, I'mdoing the tri trade for try to
promote some high school kidsthat's with your company.
Speaker 1 (25:57):
Yes, it's an inspection company.
Yes, exactly, yep um.
Speaker 2 (26:01):
So I'm doing that uh to try to promote some people to
get into the inspections, getinto the trade world, um, and
then I'm also helping out withthe judging for the um welding
competitions, I believe, thisafternoon and then tomorrow as
well, both the post-secondaryand the secondary.
Speaker 1 (26:17):
Yes, yeah, have you judged before?
Speaker 2 (26:19):
I did uh when I was in college.
We had the uh provincialcompetitions at the nvcc monkton
so we just had them for the uhthe welding students there see
who was going to be moving on tothe provincial competitions.
So we did an in-houseinspections and stuff like that
so pretty excited are you pumped?
Speaker 1 (26:35):
I am pretty excited to see what's out there.
You know, what do you?
Which one's easier for you tojudge, the secondary or
post-secondary?
Speaker 2 (26:44):
uh, probably the, the post-secondary I was talking
about it with the ua guysearlier.
Speaker 1 (26:51):
It's like I love the secondary competitions, the high
school kids.
I mean they're, they'readorable, I don't know how else
to say it.
Speaker 2 (26:57):
I love seeing the young welders come up and and
working so hard like I meanthey're, they're trying so hard,
but uh, you could also tellthey're still in high school,
right yeah, I like thepost-secondary too, because,
working in the industry andstuff, this might be somebody
that you run into in the future.
Right so you get to kind of seewhere they're at right now and
maybe you'll meet them five, tenyears down the road or a year
down the road and kind of seelike, oh they're, they're kind
(27:19):
of honing their skills now,right, so one of the things I've
always noticed after years nowof being involved with these
things decades.
Speaker 1 (27:27):
God, I'm old is that even the ones that just show up
to these competitions likeyou're maybe not even going to
place top 10.
But you're here, you're trying,you're competing.
You're already steps ahead ofsomeone who didn't.
You already have an advantagein the industry, steps ahead of
someone who didn't.
You already have an advantagein the industry.
(27:47):
You're probably going to getout there and get a better job
and make more money becauseyou're willing to put your neck
out there.
Speaker 2 (27:51):
Yes, for sure, I think that goes a long way just
to, like you said, put yourselfout there.
It definitely gives you thatkind of advantage in just your
attitude and your work ethic.
I find Right.
Speaker 3 (28:02):
Yeah, I tried to do the in-house competition and it
didn't in just like yourattitude and your work ethic.
Speaker 2 (28:05):
I find you know right .
Yeah, I uh, I took the.
I tried to do like the in-houseand or the in-house um
competition when I was in highschool, just with the welding
students.
Some of the weld tech studentsdid the welding as well yeah I'd
been practicing for weeks,weeks and then when I got there,
it just, it just didn't turnout the way I wanted it to, so I
didn't end up moving on.
But, um, anyway, I did that,but it was just looking back on
(28:25):
it.
It was just like the, themindset, just to go and try
something and, and you know, putyourself out there.
Speaker 1 (28:30):
So what are the things that you know you need
for these types of things,because this is a competition
right Is that competitive spirit, that desire to win and to
compete against other people andsee where you are.
You know how important have youseen that be in your career.
You know, when you're out inthe workplace, when you're out
in the field, that competitivespirit amongst welders.
Speaker 2 (28:52):
For sure, I think it's.
There's a very big competitivecompetitiveness with welders for
sure, because I mean you'regetting into an industry and
there's thousands and thousandsof other people that are kind of
like you know could be a lotbetter than you, could be a lot
worse than you, whatever.
So I think it's really importantto kind of have that
competitive edge, especially asan apprentice, like practicing
(29:14):
at home, taking your days offand maybe going to your welding
hall if you're in the union andpracticing and kind of.
You know, just if you have thatcompetitive edge, you just
might be a little bit betterthan than the next guy and you
might end up keeping your jobright so I think I think it kind
of ultimately comes down tothat and what about as an
inspector?
Speaker 1 (29:35):
do you find that it changes much?
Speaker 2 (29:38):
for for the competitiveness?
Speaker 1 (29:39):
do you try to be a better inspector than the
inspectors around you?
Are you trying to out-inspectthem?
Speaker 2 (29:49):
Yeah, I definitely do try to put myself there as
having good work ethic.
It's always just been like apride thing for me, like I just
don't like leaving somethingunfinished or doing something
half I guess, yeah, better orworse, but so I don't know I I I
guess there's not as muchcompetition as like in the
welding industry, I guess, forthat way.
(30:09):
But um, I'm not trying to outinspect anybody but how many
inspections have you done today?
I did 24, you know it's not moreso about that.
It's more so just about likehaving tidy work, making sure
that.
Speaker 1 (30:23):
Clean documentation, Exactly right.
Speaker 2 (30:24):
Like, if you're doing a package and you have
everything organized, if thenext guy picks it up, he should
know exactly where you left offright, not leaving everything in
a mess and just taking pride inyour work honestly.
Speaker 1 (30:34):
And where do you see yourself going with your
inspection game?
You know you went from levelone to level two.
Do you see a level three inyour future?
Not a lot of people go that far.
Speaker 2 (30:44):
Yeah, um, I really don't know.
I'm just, I'm uh, I'd like todo a couple api tickets okay,
I'm six year, 650s.
Yeah, yeah, and it depends whereI end up going.
Um, I really like my job at therefinery right now doing like
the maintenance gig and doingthe turnarounds and stuff, so I
stick around here.
Yeah, I might look into doingmy CWB Level 3.
I think that could be in thenear future, but I don't know.
(31:07):
If I travel around, bouncearound, I could look at doing
different other avenues gettingsome API tickets, maybe doing a
couple other code endorsementswith CWB, like your ASMEs,
exactly right.
Speaker 1 (31:15):
Or your B51s.
Yeah, although I heard there'ssome issues.
There's some pushback on thenew 51 updates.
Speaker 3 (31:21):
Oh, really yeah.
Speaker 2 (31:23):
Interesting.
Speaker 1 (31:23):
Every time there's code updates there's always some
.
It trickles down over time.
Speaker 2 (31:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (31:28):
But I mean, there's a lot of different codes out
there, you know out here.
Speaker 2 (31:38):
I don't know, does Lloyd's still push around here
for shipbuilding?
There's not as muchshipbuilding around here because
they shut down the shipyardhere.
But there definitely might bein Halifax, where they have a
big shipyard there, you knowyeah.
Speaker 1 (31:47):
I've been out to those Halifax shipyards.
They're cool.
Speaker 2 (31:49):
Yeah, they are yeah, but I mean, Irving is everywhere
out here right.
Speaker 1 (31:52):
Like even the gas station's everywhere I was like
I always forget how big of acompany Irving is until I'm back
out here.
Speaker 2 (32:02):
It's almost as popular as the Tim.
Speaker 1 (32:03):
Hortons on every corner here.
Yeah, but hopefully they'rebetter, because I don't like Tim
Hortons coffee very much.
Speaker 2 (32:06):
Yeah, more McDonald's coffee.
I am more of a McDonald'scoffee.
Speaker 1 (32:11):
Sorry, we're not sponsored by either of those
companies.
But I mean, if McDonald's wantsto sponsor yo, we're here.
Speaker 2 (32:18):
I'll take the free coffee, yeah.
Speaker 3 (32:18):
I'll take the free coffee for sure.
Speaker 1 (32:21):
So if you're not looking to get that level three,
you know, do you see yourselfat the refinery a long time?
You know, are you happy withthe gig?
You're so young.
I'm sure you probably have somethings that you'd like to check
off the bucket list.
Speaker 2 (32:34):
Oh yeah, there's definitely like a bucket list of
things I'd like to do, but Ireally it's from talking to
other inspectors and tradesmenwho've traveled and stuff like
it's really, you're reallyfortunate to work like 40 hours
a week and come home every night.
You know there's not as muchtraveling and stress financially
like when's the next shutdown,kind of thing.
So I get a lot of overtime,don't get me wrong.
(32:59):
But if I wanted to just workthe 40 hours a week and go home
every night and have my weekendsoff like I'm, and you're making
a decent living exactly right.
Speaker 1 (33:04):
I mean, overtime's always nice for welders because
it's extra money, but it's scarywhen you need overtime to
survive.
That's not what you want.
You want your normal 40 tocover life.
Yep, anything above and beyondis above and beyond right.
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (33:19):
Yeah, so I'm really fortunate to have something
local that kind of I'm able todo that, so I could see myself
staying there for a while.
But I mean if anything happens,I'd love to travel and bounce
around.
Speaker 1 (33:30):
Have you done any traveling?
Have you gone anywhere else?
Speaker 2 (33:32):
Not to work.
No, I mean, I've gone tosmaller other Atlantic provinces
.
I have Nova Scotia or PEI to dothe odd like NDE job or
whatever, but um, no, bigtraveling not yet not yet you're
open to it oh yeah, I'mdefinitely open to it what about
for your hobbies?
Speaker 1 (33:49):
is there anything that you do?
Because I mean, just thismorning, you know, we
interviewed someone, sarah, andshe does.
You know, metal art and there'sso much awesome.
I love Sarah Thornton.
Yeah, and it's something thatI've never really gotten into.
But you know, I've always foundit so interesting that people
that are in the weldingcommunity also are often so
creative.
They have a creative side tothem, and maybe I'm just the
(34:10):
weird one that doesn't have thatvery well, but you know, are
you also in that, in that bucketwhere you?
Speaker 2 (34:16):
you have a creative side, oh yeah, for sure, like I
mean, I uh, I play a coupleinstruments.
I play guitar, I play piano.
Speaker 1 (34:21):
Does that count, because I play instruments?
Yeah, that's, that's a creativeside creative outlet for sure,
yeah, cool yeah, so um, yeah,but you're definitely right.
Speaker 2 (34:29):
I find that a lot of creative people get into welding
.
It's almost like like you said,sarah, doing like the metal art
on the side.
That's's a really big thing inour industry too, and I've
noticed that a lot.
I find creative people oftenhave like steady hands too,
either from playing instrumentsor drawing or painting, or
whatever.
Speaker 1 (34:44):
And patience for sure .
Yeah, that's the thing thatmakes a good welder Art makes
you patient, because you know,trying to learn that song on
guitar man, sometimes you justwant to throw that thing out the
window.
Speaker 2 (34:54):
Yeah, I've been there Definitely smashed a few
guitars over songs.
Speaker 1 (34:59):
Over sad songs, over romantic songs, over broken
hearts.
Speaker 2 (35:02):
Pretty angry songs.
Speaker 1 (35:05):
And what about cars?
You know, you said you lovedcars, you grew up around cars.
Yes, oh my gosh, I'm a car guy.
Speaker 2 (35:10):
I've had over 30 vehicles my whole life, I love
vehicles, I love, I can't I'vebeen waiting to pull my cars out
of storage right now, but it'sstill snowing in Saskatchewan,
so oh, really, yeah, I just tookmine out of storage.
Actually, I, uh, I have threevehicles right now.
I just bought a new truck Well,it's new to me, it's an older
truck.
Speaker 3 (35:28):
It's a 75 Ford.
Speaker 2 (35:40):
Um, I just bring it out here, actually, but my
starter just went so and uh, 75ford, it's a f100.
F100, so that's 302 or it has a390 in it 390.
Speaker 1 (35:44):
Oh, that's a great engine.
Yeah, heavy and low, but it's.
It's good, sounds pretty good.
But that starter is going tohave a separate bend x on it.
It's all a solenoid it'll be,uh, yeah.
Speaker 2 (35:52):
So I mean that's, that's good.
Yeah, something I'll probablyget into tonight and end up
working really late on.
Speaker 1 (35:58):
I got a 2019 Mustang Roush.
Speaker 2 (36:02):
Oh, do you.
Speaker 1 (36:02):
Yeah, which is pretty fun.
But I love all cars.
I've had all the makes, all thebrands.
I'm not like a Chevy guy ornothing like that.
Speaker 2 (36:10):
Yeah, neither am I.
Because they're all fun, theyall got their own little quirks
to them that are cool.
Yeah, totally.
I got a couple gmcs too, andthen I have this.
This is my first ford, but Imean, I'm not, I'm not a brand
person either.
Yeah, yeah, like I have a chevytruck and a ford mustang, so
whatever I kind of consider,like if you're into the cars too
, like that's kind of like anartsy side to you like I feel
like vehicles are art right yeah, I used to.
Speaker 1 (36:31):
I used to like customize it.
When I was younger I was reallybig into like dropping them
down, lowering them, big stereos, all that cool stuff.
But I mean, it's one of theluxuries that you can have as a
welder, because you can affordhobbies like that yes, exactly
right, it's one of the things Ialways tell young people about
getting into the trades,especially women, because when
you look at the, the list insociety of like things that make
(36:55):
life difficult, economicsecurity, financial security, is
like number one yeah, rightbecause if you can't afford to
live, you're not dreaming,you're not thinking about the
future, you're not thinkingabout hobbies, you're not
thinking about art, you know,you're not thinking about these
things, you're just thinkingabout surviving.
And the trades give you thatluxury, afford you the luxury
(37:17):
that hard work will allow you togo buy a 1975 ford 100 and make
it a project vehicle.
Why?
Speaker 2 (37:23):
because you can yeah, right, and that's fun, that's
great yeah, I definitely havebeen really fortunate, like
getting into into the trades youdo work.
You work long hours.
You're going to miss out on onfamily events and holidays and
stuff like that sometimes.
But, um, I've been reallyfortunate Like I'm only 24 right
now.
I just bought my first house inNovember and it's been kind of
like a crazy time for housingand stuff like that, yeah,
(37:45):
that's wild, right.
Speaker 1 (37:46):
So many 24-year-olds are struggling around the world
right now.
Speaker 2 (37:50):
Yeah, exactly.
So I mean, it's kind of crazy,I guess.
But yeah, yeah, I've beenpretty fortunate enough to to
have a job that that lets me dothat and uh, the trades are
definitely it if you want tohave some financial security
yeah, I mean, I don't know,fortunate's the word.
You're hard working that istrue, you build your own luck,
you know.
Speaker 1 (38:09):
I mean, you know you say you got to be good to be
lucky and lucky to be good,right, yeah, so it's.
Uh.
It's one of those things wherewe try to tell people and like
you said it best yes, there'shard days, work, you might miss
birthdays, you might misswhatever's, but what do you gain
?
Right?
Like you gain so much on theback side right yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (38:30):
No, I totally agree so what's next?
Speaker 1 (38:32):
uh, for this week, you know, you got the judging
today, judging tomorrow, you gotthe booth, and then that's it.
Back home, then back to work onMonday.
Speaker 2 (38:42):
Yeah, pretty much.
Yeah, the dream is over, thedream is over.
Yeah, yeah, I don't got muchelse on the go, honestly.
Speaker 1 (38:48):
Yeah, awesome.
Well, I hope we have time to goout and see all the judging
later.
I know we want to take picturesand talk to the competitors too
.
I think we might actually havetime here right away at
lunchtime.
But thanks so much for comingon the show.
It's been lots of fun.
I learned lots today.
I learned about New Brunswickand I can't wait to hopefully
see you guys out in Regina tocome out to Skills.
Speaker 2 (39:10):
Oh, yeah, for sure I'd love to come out.
Speaker 1 (39:12):
Yeah, it'll be a good time.
Awesome.
Thanks, max yeah, you bet.
And for all the people thathave been following along,
thanks so much for being a partof the podcast.
Remember to download, share andalso our fan mail feature.
You know we're collecting allthese fan mails that we're
getting, cause we're going tostart doing them in reels.
We've got a plan.
Trust me, the ones you've beenKeep sending us information.
(39:39):
We love to hear it and we'llcatch you at the next one.
We hope you enjoy the show.
Speaker 3 (39:50):
Do you own a company in the welding industry or want
to share a targeted message withour listeners?
Then this 45-second audio adspace could be yours.
We have the coolest listenersfrom all over the world, with
over 60,000 downloads, and 88%are from North America.
This podcast serves to educateand connect the welding
(40:11):
community together and isavailable on all major platforms
, including the CWB GroupNetwork.
And is available on all majorplatforms, including the CWB
Group Network.
If you are interested, reachout to info at cwbassociationorg
.
Look at that.
I just gave you all of thatinformation in only 45 seconds.
You've been listening to theCWB Association Welding Podcast
(40:32):
and if you enjoyed what youheard today or want to send us
some questions to answer, youcan text the show using the link
in the episode descriptionbelow.
We can't wait to hear from you.
Please subscribe or visit us atcwbassociationorg to learn more
.
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