Page 171 - Adobe Photoshop PDF

Nejma, where we lived. The entire home construction program was run
directly out of Dhahran and was under the primary jurisdiction of the
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plaints that the construction was defective. All of us were a bit hesitant
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One evening I drove Jean and the kids to Rahaima to inspect the
construction. I found that I could crush some of the concrete blocks with
my hands – they had been made with too little cement. Arabs are great
seekers of privacy and so the land behind each home had to be enclosed
with a concrete block wall that was 6 feet high. The block walls were
supposed to have reinforcing rods in concrete pilasters spaced about 10
feet apart. I found that I could take hold of the top of the concrete block
wall and wiggle the wall like a whip. Steel reinforcing rod was virtually
unknown in the construction. Incidentally, Mohammed bin Awad din
Laden, the father of Osama bin Laden, was the owner of the construc-
tion company.

The next day I reported the situation to Larry Rushmer, the dis-
trict manager. Larry tried to pooh-pooh the problem. I insisted it was a
potential disaster, both to the employees and the company. My report
of problems brought the Director of Industrial Relations, Wally Weber,
and George Johnson, the head of the home loan program, down to Ras
Tanura. Their immediate attitude was to doubt the accuracy of my re-
port. Prior to their coming, I had borrowed Ed Fowler, an engineer in
the engineering division – and had him inspect the construction before
the Dhahran contingent arrived. Ed led us to Rahaima and quickly dem-
onstrated that the entire project to date was a disaster. In addition, there
was too little fall in the sewer lines for them to drain properly. The
houses and walls that had been constructed had been in complete viola-
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The results were interesting. Executive management in Dhahran
authorized us to negotiate with the employees whose houses had been
built, which would entail them moving their families out of the houses

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