Both crane hire and special transport jobs were split into capacity classes. Crane jobs were divided by load weight: those over, and under, 100t.
For the larger crane jobs, first place went to Sarens, which constructed and raised the 340t Olympic arch with two 800t cranes and a strand jack system. Second place went to Mammoet, which developed a special lifting system with a ground-based tailing and its massive Platform Twin-Ring Containerised (PTC) crane to raise a 100m long, 2,200t process module. Third place went to Mediaco of France, which used two 700 tonners, one 450 tonner and a 300 tonner to tandem lift and transport a bridge section a distance of 400m.
For the smaller lifting jobs, first place went to Mammoet, which designed and built a derrick on a barge to lift an excavator that was mired in mud. Second place went to Saan of the Netherlands for its job lifting escalators into place in an underground metro station. It used two city cranes in tandem to lift the escalators. BMS of Denmark took third place for its work lifting and tilting an automobile. “We had a lot of problems putting a new Audi in a door,” said managing director Soren Jansen.
Special transport jobs were also divided by their scale.
In the larger category, first place went to Mammoet, which moved 18 process modules, each weighing 1,880t, on Sakhalin Island in the Sea of Okhotsk, eastern Russia. The move included 265 axles of SPMTs travelling over soft ground and over an 800m-long bridge. “It is not difficult to supply the equipment. You have to have a good crew of people, who are enthusiastic, social, technical and professional. Therefore I am very proud to accept this,” said Roderick van Seumeren, Mammoet managing director.
Second place went to the UK’s Collett for its transport of a piperack module. The job used a computer programme to plan what street furniture would need moving. Third place went to TLW Leclerc of France for its work right after Christmas to transport a 39m-long process tank. These jobs were greater than 120t gross vehicle weight, including tractor unit, less than 35m long, less than 4.5m wide and 4.4m high.
The other set of awards went to jobs that were smaller than these measurements. Capelle of France took first place for its method of transporting boats. The transport system has extended the business of the shipyard by providing a way to deliver larger ships than before. Megalift of Germany took second place for its work to create a standard transport method for moving the uppers of the Airbus A300 airplane between the factory and the final assembly site. Mammoet of the Netherlands took third place for developing a method to transport wind turbines on a deep low loader.
The organisation also named Marceau Cochez, the founder of the French crane users association SNUG, its man of the year. Cochez created SNUG in 1973, and was president of the organisation from 1982-1997. “I wasn’t expecting this – you are good friends,” he said on accepting the award.
