As it’s structured now, the oil industry in Alberta depends on fly in/fly out workers. They eat and sleep in work camps while they’re on the job, returning home for a few days whenever a two or three weeks shift is over. Camp culture is bred of strain and exhaustion, loneliness and boredom.
Physical isolation, limited facilities, and spotty internet mean that men in camp are cut off not only from their families but from other sources of encouragement, recreation and support.