Twenty one years after being painted on Tank 79, the Enbridge Mural is getting another lease on life as it undergoes a restoration.

“It’s twice in a lifetime I get a chance to work on the coolest thing that I’ve probably ever done in my career,” said Barry Sudom, Project Manager for the Tank 79 Restoration.

Sudom was working for Enbridge Pipeline in 1998 when he led the original project to paint the mural on one of the eight tanks on the site. Now working for Commercial Sandblasting and Painting, Sudom is leading the restoration of the mural, which is underway on the tank overlooking the Ring Road in Regina.

“We’ve sanded the entire area – so that’s 10-11,000 square feet that was sanded – we’re going to give it a good chemical wash and get rid of all the chalk and anything else that’s on there, and we’re going to get a real clean, shiny surface here and then the artists can start doing their magic,” said Sudom.

Artist Grant McLaughlin, who is best known for his work on the Murals of Moose Jaw, will be heading up the painting of the mural.

With an estimated 120 gallons of paint being used to cover almost 10,000 square feet, McLaughlin says this is the largest project that he’s ever worked on.

“The size of the mural sort of speaks for itself, but just the complexity of putting the whole process together certainly makes it a big project,” said McLaughlin.

Earlier this year, Enbridge had a choice of restoring the mural or painting over it with white paint. They decided to go with the restoration at a cost of $400,000.

“It’s a source of pride for all of our employees in the Regina area,” said Justin Mrazek, Supervisor with Enbridge. “It’s one of the things we’re known for, it’s basically the symbol of who Enbridge is in the city.”

Sudom is proud to see the mural living on, “It’s absolutely wonderful that it’s being done and as you can tell, I’m just as passionate now in 2019 as I was when we put it up in the first place in 1998,” he said.

With the prep work complete, the re-painting of the mural will begin next week and take about three weeks to complete, weather permitting.