Texas Tech Alumnus Available To Discuss Lifesaving Research, Life in Oil Business

WHAT:           Media availability for Bob Garrett, Texas Tech University alumnus and creator of lifesaving method for detecting harmful gasses when drilling for oil and natural gas. WHEN:           3-5 p.m. Monday (Aug. 11) WHERE:         Room 102 of the Chemistry Building on the Texas Tech campus. EVENT:          Bob Garrett, a native of Abernathy and a graduate of Texas Tech University, will be available to the media for interviews while touring the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry. He can discuss his role as a researcher for an oil company during the 1950s as well as a method for detecting dangerous gasses during the drilling process. After graduating in 1957 with a master's degree in chemistry, Garrett landed a job at Humble Oil & Refining Co. in the company's well-regarded research program. Under the mentorship of another Texas Tech chemistry graduate, Fred Brooks, the two worked frequently with the very best and recognized consultants - many Nobel Prize laureates, such as Peter Debye, Edward Teller, Philip Low and Van Neumann. Garrett invented the Garrett Gas Train, which quickly detects dangerous and poisonous hydrogen sulfide when drilling oil and gas wells. This method, along with detecting carbon dioxide, is widely used on rigs and approved by the American Petroleum Institute and International Standards Organization as recognized test procedures. CONTACT: Bob Garrett, Texas Tech graduate and former Humble Oil & RefiningCo. employee, cell phone (979) 224-6856, or (806) 722-2726 while in Lubbock. Dominick Casadonte, chairman of the Department of Chemistry andBiochemistry, Texas Tech University, (806) 742-1832, or dominick.casadonte@ttu.edu