Alberta Inventors and Inventions

Oil exploration and production can be a dangerous business in Alberta. Pipelines rupture, wells go wild and blowout. Since 1956, Calgary-based Safety Boss Inc. has been dealing with oilfield disasters at home and abroad.

K.J. "Smokey" Miller founded Safety Boss in 1956, operating in the oilfields of Drayton Valley, Alberta. In 1962, he set up a head office in Red Deer; a station continued operating in Drayton Valley for another 20 years.

Safety Boss operated close to home throughout the 1960s and 1970s, until Mike Miller, Smokey’s son, took over the business. Mike had spent much of the 1970s working on oil-well blowouts internationally, and in 1979, decided to market the company abroad. The first international job took place in Iran in 1982. Since then, Safety Boss has worked on jobs in Libya, Kenya, India and Pakistan, among others.

While skilled and successful, Safety Boss remained fairly unknown on the international scene, when compared to large industry legends. Their reputation exploded, however, in 1991 with their performance in Kuwait.

After losing the Gulf War to the United States, Iraqi troops set fire to hundreds of oil wells during their retreat. Several companies were called upon to put out the blazes, in order to stop an unprecedented ecological disaster.

With a combination of know-how, advanced technology and reliable equipment, including the Smokey fire trucks, a potent well-capping weapon, Safety Boss distinguished itself, putting out more fires than any other company.

Mike Miller, CEO of Safety Boss, attributes their success in part to experience dealing with hydrogen sulfide (H2S), the best equipment and the most efficient fire-stopping techniques, which the other companies could not match. Miller also credits the wealth of well-control experience possessed by Safety Boss employees.

The Kuwait fires project placed Safety Boss into the top four oil-well firefighting companies worldwide. For some time after that, Miller focused on international incidents, but has since refocused back home, to Canada. Safety Boss continues to maintain a long list of clients who depend on their expertise when emergencies occur.

Click here for more information on this innovative Alberta company.