Ghel-men

Everyone respects the whaler, brave hunter of the sea, facing storm, great beast, cold and wind and sleet. As they should. But does anyone respect the humble Ghel-man? The manufacturer of...well everything from their lantern oil, to cooking lard? Their GALRT fuel to their winter cloaks snow and windproof seals? Their soaps ta their greases and lubricants for their fancy machines! Whale oil and the various Gels, lards and greases we make from it keep this economy turning lads and lasses! Maybe its about time we teach 'em to respect us, eh!?

Hired Agitator trying to spark a wildcat strike and unionization movement of Ghel-men in Higveld

Working the factories along the docks in many sea ports across Suranth, these humble men and women are more vital to the economy than any gives them credit for, and they are treated abhorrently. Fifteen to sixteen hour work days, if they are lucky they get a few minutes for lunch, elsewise they must eat whilst working, removing their safety mask and inhaling the various chemicals and corrosives used in any given number of processes. Accidents are a regular occurence and nothing is ever done to make it safer. Fatalties are not uncommon, most factories experiencing one to two of them a month. The wages are decent, but with no protections should you get injured on the job, no guild to protect or back you. And generally injuries acquired in such employment will be permanently crippling or disfiguring. They are looked on as a filthy, dark spot in society, and their work has always been massively under-appreciated.

Recently, in both Geata-Iarainn and An Pointe Thoir, a factory went up in flames, the cause unknown, but it is only unknown cause no official cause of the fires was ever given, and workers simply ordered to go back to work in another overcrowded facility. No official investigation was ever launched. Survivors know full well what happened. The piping for pumping the oil through was old, corroded, and not cared for properly....and burst over a bunch of wooden pallets that had never been disposed of because "We will send them back to reuse, its more cost effective." The boiling hot oil ignited the pallets and the fire spread quickly to other highly flammable materials and chemicals, and through the pipes all through the various systems of vats and boilers.

The Ghel-men are furious now though, as no less than forty of their own perished in each blaze, and nothing is being done to address the route causes. In fact some survivors have made it quite clear what happened, yet the companies and even Suranth's government, claims it was both incidents of 'idiot workers' lighting a smoke in the distilling process, and accidentally dropping their lit smoke into a concentrated barrel of the highly flammable whale oil.

Career

Qualifications

The only real qualification is phyiscal capability. Heavy lifting, stamina. Otherwise, there is no real education requirement. Some argue their should be of course, given the risks and dangerous materials involved.

Career Progression

Being a ghel-man doesn't have a lot of room for advancement, though one can become a floor supervisor, or move into the logistics department, organizing moving of finished products, and the acquiring and moving in of raw materials.

Payment & Reimbursement

They are paid...decently, ranging from the bottom end of about one silver moon a day up into the range of fifteen silver moons a day depending on experience, skill, which machines you can operate, and if you are a section head or supervisor.

Other Benefits

Not many really, next to none. They've no guild/union, yet. There is a push to get such, but the established business owners and current leadership in many places are doing their very best to stop such actions.

Perception

Purpose

They refine the raw blubber provided by the whaling fleets into oil, and from there refine that into a variety of products, from different oils of differing consistencies, to adding any number of other substances to create Chymoil, the fuel of many smaller machines in the burgeoning industrial revolution, various waxes, adhesives, lubricants and greases used to protect various vital machine parts from wearing out/freezing. They are an extremely vital profession, despite how....poorly they are treated.

Social Status

Poor. Very poor. Not fiscally poor, but they are lower middle class, and looked upon with great disdain, despite their vital societal role.

Demographics

Many whom work here are not dwarves or humans for reasons of well....this is a profession looked upon poorly. You do not work here unless you are a 'lower class' individual and seeking to better yourself and future for your family. It is demeaning and humiliating. It is dangerous with little to no worker protection, the only positive being a kinda decent wage. Most whom work here are not human or dwarven and generally are immigrants or first generation Suranthi.

History

Ghel-man, that his the profession has a long history as a....minor profession, making lantern oil, cooking lard, and mild lubricating grease for things like pulley systems on ships, the axles of coaches/wagons etc. In the last five decades however the demand for those niche products, that is the greases and lubricants especially, along with the invention and subsequent adoption of Chymoil fueled devices across Suranth and Valerick, including of course weapons, has seen the demand rise greatly. Where once they struggled to utilize all the blubber from whaling vessels catches, indeed simply selling fair amounts of it as a cheap, if unhealthy, food source, now the whaling fleets struggle to keep up with the demand of the Ghel factories. Because of this, of course, there is the ever going search for a more readily available alternative, ideally one that can be mined in some way, but thus fair, no such discoveries have been made.

Operations

Tools

Their tools vary depending upon what they are making, but these factories contain great pumps, tanks and vats, various chemicals of all sorts and storage and tools to work with them. In theory this is meant to be tools that are safe and efficient but in reality many of these factories have been so long neglected, the workers treated like a disposable resource, that the tools now are improvised and rather unsafe, Scoops made from pine wood, aluminum cups meant to handle reactive chemicals, acids and the like, which always eventually fail. These are but small examples of the problems. This is added to the fact that rather than embrace a rival nation's tech on that level and use Magntech lighting, which would be far safer, but expensive to initially set up, most of these facilities and their owners refuse and simply use oil based lanterns.....in a facility full of highly flammable substances and materials. Because its far cheaper than making the switch.

Materials

The standard list of materials one may interact with include;

• Whale Blubber/Oil

• Coal/Coal Dust

1. Chloric Acid

• Powdered Flashrite

• Smokepowder (For making mining explosives, gelatin based)

• Sulfur

• Various Fragrance Oils (to make candles and the like with)

• Lye for soaps

• Blackthorn sap (gritty harsh corrosive used as an additive to make oil for sharpening steels/etching them)

Workplace

It is abhorrant. Cramped, with no real room to move, the heat, even in the tundra, is unbearable, and dehydration is quite common. As are burns and chemical injuries, and injuries from failing equipment, which has been poorly maintained and with no real system for workers to establish pressure in place, is likely to never change. Claustrophobic, the air filled with corrosives, strong fragrances, sulfur and smokepowder, a volatile and unhealthy chemical mix. A few of the 'nicer' factories provide basic masks, though how much they help is questionable. Most do not, and the best their employees have is a scarf they keep tied around their face, which though it does nothing for their lungs and airways, which will eventually fail, burned and torn up in a condition known as Burn-Breath syndrome, it does help avoid daily nose bleeds and raw tongue, along with accelerated tooth decay....so silver lining?

Provided Services

The products provided are a great many, and the largest sellers/most important are listed below;

• Mining Explosives

• Chymoil, the fuel for small to moderate Chymech machines and weapons.

• Machine-grade and basic simple-grade lubricants and greases

• Sulfite compounds for cleaning machine parts to within an inch of their life

• Blade forging oils

• Lantern fuel

• Soaps and Candles

• Lard/oils for cooking/eating

Dangers & Hazards

The lists of potential hazards are also many;

• Loss of life/limb from crushing, burning, machine severing, heat stroke, dehydration, pure exhaustion just to name a few

• A variety of illnesses and chronic conditions including the dreaded and always terminal eventually, Burn-Breath Syndrome

• Sterility, there does seem to be a correlation between this profession and loss of reproductive ability

• Cancers, as it seems, for an unknown reason, that those whom work in these facilities are far more likely to develop cancers.

• Any number of contagious illnesses if there is an outbreak, as your working conditions do not allow for any sort of....distance keeping from fellow employees.

And these are just the big ones. There are all sorts of others, and things no one talks about but are known to happen, including worker abuses en masse. Those whom have ever tried to raise their voice....always seem to have a 'workplace accident' not long after.

Alternative Names

Slicker

Demand

High

Legality

The profession is not only legal but it is so vital that the industry, even in this age of industrialization and workers coming together and taking some power (Guilds and Unionization) and governments acquiesing these things as those with working class backgrounds gain some position and political power....even with all that, this profession is so vital that the industry gets away with all the things listed within this article. This is even as the other Guilds and Unions where appropriate push for safety measures, more reasonable working periods (no more 16 hour days, 12 should be more than sufficient, and only six days a week, no more seven day, things like this). This profession, this group are being left behind, and it seems no one cares. They are looked upon so poorly that everyone just pretends it isn't happening, even as legislation exists clearly outlawing some of these practices.