ESTA has released the detailed results of its industry-wide safety survey.
The results revealed that safety is a high priority for the vast majority of companies, management and employees in the European heavy lifting and abnormal transport industry – but adds that there is more work to do if the highest standards are to be achieved.
Freely available to ESTA members
The full document is freely available to ESTA members – and their members – from the Knowledge Base section of the ESTA website library and will provide the basis for ESTA’s future safety priorities
The survey aimed to provide a clear and data-driven picture of how employees across the industry perceive safety within their organisations and how ESTA can contribute to improve safety in the sector. It was carried out in October and November last year.
Challenges
By gathering feedback directly from professionals working in the field, the survey identifies challenges and improvement areas related to safety behaviour, leadership, communication and learning practices.
It focussed on 5 topics:
- safety perception
- safety culture and reporting
- HSE performance and challenges
- expectations from ESTA
- willingness to share and collaborate
Embedded safety culture
The survey confirms that the heavy lift and transport sector has a mature and strongly embedded safety culture, with safety widely regarded as a top priority in daily operations.
Employees feel personally responsible for safety and in the vast majority of cases feel they are supported by visible leadership involvement, established management systems, and structured monitoring through KPIs, reporting, and site inspections.
Key risk factors
At the same time, the survey highlights persistent challenges. Human behaviour, workload pressure, dynamic project environments and inconsistent communication between contractors and clients remain key risk factors.
The survey’s conclusion warns: “While most organisations can meet or exceed client HSE requirements, variation in client standards, administrative burden and a lack of harmonisation across Europe continue to create complexity and inefficiency.”
And It adds: ‘Respondents clearly indicate that further safety improvements depend more on behaviour, mindset, training, learning and collaboration than on additional rules.”
Strong support for sharing incident information
Importantly, the survey shows that there is strong support for sharing incidents and lessons learned, developing practical tools for daily operations, harmonising standards
and training, and strengthening collective learning throughout across the sector.
It demonstrated high levels of trust in ESTA as a neutral and reliable platform, with
90% of respondents being confident that ESTA can collect and share safety data responsibly, and respondents showed a strong willingness to collaborate.
Two new working groups
Based on the survey outcomes, ESTA’s HSE Commission has established two dedicated working groups – one on incident sharing and the second on safety standards and best practice. Information from these working groups will be published in due course.
Iffet Türken, Chair of the HSE Commission, thanked all the individuals and organisations that participated and said: “The survey provided us with invaluable insights into our members’ safety issues and concerns and will help ESTA determine our priorities in this area.”
“It has given us strong foundations on which the ESTA HSE Commission can build in the future.”
Background
ESTA’s HSE Commission – HSE stands for Health, Safety and Environment – was created in late 2023 as a permanent addition to ESTA’s structure.
It aims to facilitate the sharing of best practice and information, boost collaboration and foster a culture of continuous learning with a focus on legislative coordination, standardization of procedures and risk prevention.
The Commission consults widely as required, but its core members are:
Iffet Türken (Chair), Kässbohrer
Patrick van den Berg, VVT
Luca Fantini, Fagioli
Blanca Claeyssens, ASA France
Wim Dijkshoorn, Mammoet
Graziella Merny, Sarens
André Doesburg, Wagenborg Nedlift
Nils Lundgren, BMS
Peter Brown, CPA.
The Commission’s work is supported by:
Connie Lindhoud, ESTA Workgroup Secretary
Miguel Florez de la Colina. ESTA Policy Officer