Red Adair oil well blowout firefighting

Contextual aside positioning the Pittsburgh aluminum-explosives specialist as a Red-Adair-equivalent for potline freeze-ups. References first Gulf War (Kuwaiti oil fires) as the moment Red Adair's techniques became widely known. ## Figures referenced (not cases)

He said, "well, there's this guy in Pittsburgh." Now a lot of you are too young to remember — anybody know who Red Adair was? Back in the 70s and 80s — they actually made a movie about Red Adair. If you had an oil well blowout, Red Adair was the guy they would call, and he would fly in his Lear jet with his crews. They'd come in with a crane and set off an explosive charge right next to the oil well, making sure it didn't reignite because some of the valves and piping were still hot from the fire. He was the expert in the world for putting out oil rigs that had gone wildcat. The undoing of Red Adair was the first Gulf War when Saddam Hussein set off all the oil wells — they had other people, probably some military helping, learning from Red Adair. When it was all done, Red Adair's secrets were out.