Saving the Environment

As you walk onto the work cite you hear machines moving, the breaking of rocks and shovels hitting the dirt. How do you do such a dangerous job? That's just one of many question I asked Vincent DeGori who works for Luzon an environmental company. Luzon has been around since 1975 and has recycled more than 15 million gallons of oil and has decontaminated over 20 million gallons of water.  There are many things that the workers of Luzon do, and that includes cleaning up oil spills, do testing's to see if there are any leaks and they dispose of hazardous wastes. This company does everything in their power to help clean up the environment. You may ask yourself, how do they deal with such dangerous equipment? Well, I talked to Vincent DeGori and he helped me to understand.

Vincent DeGori is the Forman here at Luzon and has worked for them for over 30 years. Vincent's a black haired, tall, blue-eyed man, who is very hardworking and has a deep, stern voice. His co-worker, Tony Weygant said, " Vinny gets his work done the right way, we have tough jobs and we have even tougher ones than that, but we all get it done and we get it done the right way." I asked Vincent why he chose to work in this career and he said, " I wasn't planning on it, I just fell in it. All I want is to clean up the environment and help make it a better place." When speaking to Vincent you could tell that he cares a lot about the people he works with and also really cares about his job.


As you walk out to the job site at a gas station, all you could smell was the oil from the leak they had. You could see men digging holes, machines pushing dirt, and trucks pulling up to the site.  The first thing the men did was break the rocks with a hydraulic machine, so that way they could get to the soil and dig a huge hole to get to wear the tank is. They had two black pipes, which were wells that pump the ground water into a frack tank for contaminated water. After it goes into the frack tank it then gets treated in a carbon water system, which then gets discharged with the department of environmental conservations approval (DEC). Vincent then said," the soil gets pulled out and shipped to a soil facility so they could test it." At the soil facility they test the soil to make sure that it's no longer contaminated. Vincent had said that all the men have to have OSHA training in order to work with what they are doing. OSHA training helps provide you with hands on training, and helps you avoid any safety hazard risks that may occur. I asked Vincent how many tanks he pulled out in his career and he said, "I pulled so many tanks out in my life time, I came to realize that one in every 5 petroleum tanks leak."

As you watch them dig, you would realize that they don't go so close to the hole because at any time that hole can cave in; it's very dangerous to be in a machine at the time of digging the hole. The picture to the right is what the men have to wear when they go in the tanks to clean it. Vincent said" We always wear protection on our bodies, we actually have to go in the tanks when we put them in, and we scrub it clean with water to make sure there aren't any leaks." I spoke to another worker, Forrest Mohn, who had told me a story that had happened to him while he was working on the job, he had said," I was cleaning a frack tank and the chemicals had burnt my hazmat suit, which then ended up giving me a chemical burn, and that followed my veins up my arm and I had to go to the hospital." After I heard this I have learned that this job can be very dangerous.

Watching these men do their jobs was an amazing experience; I had learned a lot of information about the different processes it takes to build a gas station, and what they go through to get the job done. This job can be tough and dangerous but these men still do it.  This team of men work hard to help clean up the environment and help to make it a better place.