Carl Ahlstrom
Style #2412, Rocky Mountain House, AB, CA
Carl Ahlstrom video
Carl Ahlstrom
Pipeline Construction Superintendent
I started running heavy equipment at 14 years old.
Back then, you just needed to show up, learn fast, and hold your own. I did, and I kept doing it for the next 45 years. I spent the last 25 of those as a superintendent with Benedict Pipeline, working all over Alberta and British Columbia. Swamps, river crossings, frozen peat bogs… you name it. If there was pipe to put in the ground, we got it done.
Some jobs meant seven straight months in the wilderness, managing crews of up to 200 on a 24-and-4 schedule. Laying triple lines through 40 kilometers of rough country, rivers, and weather that'd drop to -40°. We'd leave in October and not see home again until spring. But I never asked anything of my crew I wasn't willing to do myself. When the job wrapped, I stayed until the final pressure test. I was the last to leave.
To me, leadership meant knowing people, not just their job titles. Every morning before the safety meeting, I greeted each person by name. Whether it was 20 workers or 200, it didn't matter. That was important to me. Over time, they started calling me "Dad," and some of them would shift their schedule just to land a spot on a crew I was running. Not because I was the easiest boss, but because they knew I respected them and had their back.
Without the people, you got nothing, I’d go to the wall for them. They’d go to the wall for me.
CARL AHLSTROM
Even now, retired, I still lace up my Red Wings every morning. I wore them in the oil fields. I wear them on the ranch. We raise Angus and Simmental cattle out here, and the work doesn’t stop just because I punched out of pipeline life. My daughter works in energy too. She’s a pipeline inspector now, wearing Red Wings, just like me. I guess some things get passed down without ever needing to be said.
I never set out to be known for anything. I just did my job, treated people with respect, and made sure the work was done right. That’s how I was raised, and that’s how I tried to lead. If folks remember me as someone who gave a damn about the work, about his crew, and about getting it right, then that’s more than enough.
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