Licence to Drill

Cody and Logan encounter a driller's nightmare beneath the rig they are working on. Kelly has to break in a new rig and struggles with the task.

Near Eckville, AB, Kelly grapples with a brand new rig, a green crew and the unpredictable motorman Ryan “Hutch” Hutchinson, whose rig floor antics and safety violations put the entire crew at risk. On Rig 3, recently promoted derrickhand Mike Bencz can’t keep the rig’s mud flowing. Cody’s drilling is delayed, but when the coffee runs out, roughneck Travis Flexhaug finds out his days on the oil patch are numbered.

When equipment fails, the rig 6 crew gets off to a rough start and is forced to muscle the 313-kilogram pipes out of the well, old-school. On Rig 3, Kelly feels the heat of a surprise safety inspector. In Medicine Hat, AB, fledgling driller Colten Bosch leaves home for Rig 3, where a motley crew of rookies learns that stress trickles down and some bosses are impossible to please.

Fresh prairie air can’t revive the exhausted Rig 3 crew, so driller Cody has to think outside the doghouse box to get his boys back in the oil game, even if it means playing shrink to sad-faced motorhand Jesse Halikas. Rig 6 loses a driller and Kelly gets one week to train the poker-faced derrickhand Jeff Wilson. But when it comes to the driller’s exam, there’s no bluffing this bad boy, and Jeff is on his own.

Rig 6’s Jeff Wilson sizzles in the hot seat with a brand new Licence to Drill and Ely Ryan, his rapping roughneck. Ely’s reckless ways run him into a ditch, as Jeff struggles to stay cool with a top drive spinning out of control and three bosses breathing down his neck. Over at Rig 3, a monster truck stands by to drag the rig to its next well. Leaky mud tanks and a lazy welder hold Cody back, threatening to stop him from getting the job done in record time.

Logan and the boys soak up the sun and shovel snow as they wait for orders from Calgary. Will Rig 3 move to another well site, or head to the racks for spring break-up? Kelly and the crew at Rig 6 troubleshoot a failing mud pump and a renegade drill bit that veers off-course. If they finish this well fast, they could squeeze in one more, but Kelly and his bosses don’t see eye to eye on how to get the job done.

John Williams is back, this time overseeing 7 rigs and drilling 63 wells, investigating the cores of some of the world’s largest oil reserves. Over 400 kilometres south, Kelly and his crew are still hoping to work through spring break-up. Kelly puts in extra hours as a loader operator, and watches helplessly as the driller on duty struggles to ram pipe into a jagged well.

Kelly and the boys of Rig 6 are back in the oil patch, gunning for the first well of the summer season. But blue skies and sunshine can’t ease the rocky re-entry of a rusty rig and a flabby crew into the high-stakes world of drilling. Rig 3 is still on the racks, and Cody Wilson is going stir crazy, until a surprise promotion triggers a showdown with his old rival, Kelly. Cody confronts a steep learning curve, until a summer rig reunion softens the blow.