The winners of the 2021 ESTA Awards were announced last week in a well-received online ceremony that attracted almost 300 participants. Details of all the winners and finalists are below.
1.CRANES, TELESCOPIC, LIFTING CAPACITY MORE THAN 120 TONNES
WINNER
Mammoet Europe
Three wheeled mobile cranes were chosen over one crawler crane for the installation of a steel bridge structure stretching the entire length of a skate park and fitting into an existing 70 metre tall tower, all with a mid-air handover of the load thrown in for good measure.
FINALISTS
Fagioli
An ancient Roman bridge played its part in the installation of a new pedestrian 115 tonne bridge using a pair of mobile cranes tandem lifting where space was severely limited.
Hanys
An unusual location for an eight axle crane at the bottom of a lock chamber added to the challenge of installing a new lock gate, in many pieces, the largest of which was 22 metres long and weighed 160 tonnes.
Schot Verticaal Transport
Careful preparation in relation to centre of gravity ensured the success of this offshore crane boom removal and re-installation job using a pair of large wheeled mobile cranes.
2. CRANES, LATTICE BOOM
WINNER
Sarens
Using the 5,000 tonne capacity SGC-250 for one of more than 700 lifts at the Hinkley Point C nuclear power station construction project in ther UK, Sarens lifted a 382 tonne steel band weighing a total of 575 tonnes with its rigging.
FINALISTS
Magdenli Transport and Trade
Erecting a large wind turbine by lifting its 108 tonne nacelle to a height of 121 metres required the services of a large crane, in this case a 650 tonne capacity crawler crane with 123 metres of boom and a 12 metre jib.
Mammoet Europe
A spectacular job to replace safety components involving a large crawler crane set up on top of the middle of a dam to lower and then lift 160 metres down to the bottom with the new part and then back up with the old one.
3. CRANES, TELESCOPIC, LIFTING CAPACITY UP TO 120 TONNES
WINNER
Wagenborg Nedlift
Limited space to change out a sludge filtering press inside a building called for the services of a pair of electric compact cranes in a tandem lift operation.
4. TRANSPORT: TRAILER AND LOAD UNDER 120 TONNES GCW (GROSS COMBINED WEIGHT)
WINNER
Laso Transportes
Transporting 12 wind turbine blades, each 67 metres long, on the torturous roads of the Portuguese island of Madeira, including negotiation of tricky tunnels and tight mountain turns, called for specialized blade lifting trailers.
FINALISTS
Bolk Transport
A pair of historic rail cars, each 22.5 metres long and weighing 50 tonnes, presented a particular set of challenges when they had to be moved by road instead of rail, especially as each loaded combination with beam trailers was 35 metres long and weighed 98 tonnes.
Collett and Sons
Sheer variety in terms of dimensions and weight, ranging from less than 6 to 44 metres and weighing up to 88 tonnes, presented its own challenges, aside from the fact that this bridge beam transport project was a 280 mile journey for 120 loads.
Friderici Special
Instead of flying a solar plane from Switzerland to Spain it was moved 1,750 km by road, in five main pieces 25 metres long weighing only a few hundred kilogrammes but all protected under cover, handled and suspended using a specially built system.
5. TRANSPORT: TRAILER AND LOAD MORE THAN 120 TONNES GCW (GROSS COMBINED WEIGHT)
WINNER
Viktor Baumann
With a centre of gravity 3.9 metres above the trailer meticulous planning was key on this transport of a 50 metre heat exchanger, forming a 503 tonne combination, 78 metres long with one truck, increasing to 108 metres with four more trucks for the 12 per cent gradients
FINALISTS
Collett and Sons
Moving four tanks, the largest three of which made a GVW of 253 tonnes and a combination length of 63 metres, was challenge enough in itself but the constraint of having to do all four of the 190 km journeys in a total of nine days added to the pressure.
Laso Transportes
Torturous mountainous roads are a well known feature of the island of Madeira that don’t make it easy to transport four 120 tonne wind turbine generators in combinations more than 70 metres long and requiring three trucks on the steepest sections.
Universal Transport Praha
A stator unit 8 metres long and weighing 184 tonnes translated for transport into a 37.5 metre long combination with a GVW of 268 tonnes for an 800 km journey across two countries.
6. COMBINED TECHNIQUES
WINNER
Mammoet Europe
A customised Mammoet DHS-500 special lifting system was used to remove three steam generators and a pressuriser as part of a nuclear power station decommissioning project in Germany.
FINALISTS
Fagioli
Among other equipment, 238 axle lines of SPMT was used to carry bridge sections weighing as much as 2,000 tonnes for the construction of the new 1,067 metre long S. Giorgio bridge in Genoa, Italy.
Friderici Spécial
A bespoke trailer and other special equipment was needed to extract a 24 tonne valve component from a cavern inside a mountain down a 450 metre tunnel with a minimum height of 2.45 metres and as little as 2.40 metres wide.
Sarens
A 1,250 tonne capacity pedestal crane mounted on a 62 x 53 metre shallow draught floating platform was put to work lifting 250 tonne foundation piles measuring up to 40 metres long for the Fryslân wind farm in the Ijsselmeer Lake, Netherlands.
7. SAFETY
WINNER
Liebherr-Werk Ehingen
Including higher maximum wind speeds with the WindSpeed load charts function is designed to improve safety and reduce the time mobile cranes are winded off.
FINALISTS
Fagioli
An app called ZAudit designed by Fagioli and software house Zucchetti to improve employee engagement with HSE requirements by ensuring rapid and immediate communication allows reporting of incidents, near misses and so on anywhere at any time.
Sarens
Wind Speed disc is a tool for crane operators to help calculate the wind speed at the top of a boom using forecasts from weather apps, online forecasts and other services.
8. INNOVATION: END USER
WINNER
Mammoet Europe
The Focus30 is described as the first high-capacity pedestal crane in the 2,500 tonne class that can be assembled vertically, designed to make it ideal for projects with complex infrastructure and space limitations.
FINALISTS
BMS
In-house designed modular electro-hydraulic crane for installation of escalators in new and existing buildings and other jobs where an easy to handle and transport crane is needed.
Fagioli
Using a catamaran specially built from barges, square tower lift masts, spreader and cross beams, plus strand jacks and skidding equipment, to install an 1,800 tonne concrete plinth in the open sea as part of the construction of a 3.4 km bridge.
Sarens
The SGC-90 is a fully electric 1,650 tonne capacity heavy lift ring crane with a maximum load moment rating of 99,000 tonne-metres, a boom up to 130 metres and a 200 tonne, 27.5 metre long jib.
9. INNOVATION: MANUFACTURER
WINNER
Liebherr Nenzing
The 220 tonne capacity LR 1200.1 unplugged and the 250 tonne LR 1250.1 unplugged are claimed as the world’s first battery-powered crawler cranes, with zero exhaust emission at the point of use.
FINALIST
Spierings Mobile Cranes
The development and implementation of the Spierings Smart Connect online platform for customers to increase the safety of their Spierings cranes via a remote controlled system of crane monitoring, live adjustment and predictive maintenance.
10. SPMT
WINNER
Wagenborg Nedlift
Using two sets of 12 axle lines of SPMT with powerpacks to move a 650 tonne block measuring 22 x 16 x 14 metres out of the factory, where side clearance was just 100 mm, to the yard outside as part of the construction of an open top multi-purpose cargo vessel.
FINALISTS
Magdenli Transport and Trade
A project to transport a 160 tonne core catcher and 3 lighter filter modules at the Akkuyu nuclear power plant on 490 hp 6×2 and 6×4 driven Goldhofer SPMT.
Mammoet Europe
Transport of a 90 metre long lattice boom weighing 800 tonnes for a new Liebherr HLC 150000 offshore crane in Rostock, Germany over a distance of 1,500 metres using 50 axle lines (200 wheels) of SPMT.
Sarens
For the transport of bridge parts weighing up to 2,500 tonnes on the project to replace the Theunis Bridge in Belgium.