Basic Energy Services, LP with corporate offices in Ft. Worth, Texas, shut down their Pratt pumping operation mid-December, laying off the entire work crew of an estimated 25 employees.
“It was a shock and unexpected. I didn’t see it coming,” said Darrell Martinez of Pratt, who had been employed as a Basic Energy Services driver for seven years.
Rocky Pierce, also of Pratt and another of the laid-off employees, said the shutdown didn’t take him by surprise, given the current economics of the oil field industry.
The shutdown affected 13 Basic Energy drilling operations in six states, with the Pratt and Liberal locations being the only ones in the state of Kansas.
(Read more: Pratt, KS – Pratt Tribune)