Bringing everyone home safely is a key objective across Major Projects at Sellafield – and the new Mobile Elevated Work Platforms (MEWP) standard launched by the Health, Safety and Wellbeing Hub, aims to do just that.
A Major Projects MEWP Co-Ordinators Engagement Day was held at Whitehaven Golf Club to bring together the Hub, PDD and PPP leaders, the supply chain and key MEWP suppliers.
The aim was to assess the new standard and see how it is being received and applied across the projects.
Within the construction industry, there are three times the amount of incidents involving Mobile Elevated Work Platforms (MEWP) compared to any other industry.
And we want to get ahead of that curve and ensure that everyone working with a MEWP is Knowingly Safe and the new standard will help ensure that.
By combining how we co-ordinate MEWP work, how we manage it through plans and procedures and then utilising the best technology available we hope to ensure that we can complete high risk work activities safely.
Following a fatality involving a MEWP during the construction of Everton FC’s new stadium, Jack Tomlinson (PPP EHS Improvement Manager), Karl Hine (Severfield EHS Lead) and Mark Atkinson (SRP Snr EHS Advisor) were asked to develop a spoke to work on MEWP management.
The spoke looked at best practice across the main Key Delivery Partners (KDPs) supply chain partners and the wider construction industry to come up with what is now the Sellafield Project Delivery Directorate (PDD) MEWP Standard.
The new standard looks at improved safety measures, using technology, a project specific MEWP management plan, increased operative competency and introduces new roles for supply chain MEWP Co-ordinator and project MEWP co-ordinators.
Duncan Elliott, Head of PPP, said:
“We want to give everyone a working environment to do the right things to make us Knowingly Safe and get the wider industry into a better place.
“It is about wanting to lead the industry but also there is a strong moral pull. In 2024 people are still being killed in the construction industry and that is unforgivable. We want to do something about that.”
Jack Tomlinson, PPP EHS Improvement Manager & MEWP Spoke Lead, said:
“Many people will remember the Government campaign about car seatbelts ‘clunk click, every trip’, launched at the time it was acceptable not to wear seatbelts.
“However because of targeted campaigns and technology, the use of seatbelts hit the ‘tipping point’ and now it is clearly unacceptable not to use seatbelts.
“We have used this approach to MEWPs. The technology is available and we must use it to bolster safe working practices during this high hazard task. I am exceptionally proud of the MEWP spoke’s work on this and it’s inspiring to see the leap we have made.”
Steve Harnwell, PPP Delivery Director for construction projects, added:
“We do a lot of work at height and part of that is using these MEWP platforms which, in itself, while safer, does present danger.
“This standard is to bring the best practice, best machines, best features in using technology with people to make people safer.
“That’s about being Knowingly Safe so people turn up at work and leave as they have arrived, back to their families.”