Mediaco, BMS, TLW Transports LeClerc, and Mammoet Deutschland have won top crane honours in ESTA Awards. The ESTA innovation award went to Peinemann Kranen for its hydraulic tube lifter and the excellence award to Terex-Demag for its 3,600t capacity CC 8800-1 Twin crawler crane. The personality of the year award went to Spierings Kranen founder Leo Spierings. In accepting the award, the Dutch truck-mounted tower crane manufacturer said: “I did my hobby the best way I could do, and it changed into a real business.” See attached file for a full list of winners.
ESTA president Christian-Jacques Vernazza, managing director of French rental company Mediaco, set the scene of the current market.
“2008 shows a little weakness in some countries, mainly for the smaller cranes. I do hope the sub-prime crisis effect will not alter our business and that we can keep on growing for many years.
“I am also somewhat worried about the increase of the fuel which can affect the profitability of our industry. Unfortunately, the users have not yet been in a position, up until now, to increase their prices at the same speed level as the manufacturers have been doing it over the last years. We are far away.”
He announced further work on the EN 13000 amendments on manual LMI overrides, to deal with US objections. He announced that ESTA, manufacturers, and US association the SC&RA is planning to meet in October to try to resolve disagreements in the EN 13000 amendments, which threaten to hamper the flow of cranes between North America and Europe.
He also used the occasion to launch a safety charter and gloss over ESTA’s ongoing work to produce pan-European drivers’ licences and standard contracts. See related story for an edited transcript of his speech.
“If safety health and environment does not start at a management level, it cannot take place anywhere,” Vernazza said, as he and fellow crane and transport leaders signed up to a 15-point safety charter. See related story for a report and the full text of the charter.
