Crane safety: owners reliant on reactive maintenance, says HSE

Tower crane owners rely too much on reactive maintenance, don’t classify faults consistently, and do not report defects high enough in the company.

These are the major findings of the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) visits to tower crane hirers, following the accidents at Battersea and Liverpool, delegates to the Construction Plant-hire Association’s (CPA) Crane Interest Group open meeting were told.

In a bid to counter these weaknesses, the new draft best practice guide on the Maintenance and Thorough Examination of Tower Cranes will require that parts and consumables are replaced on a time basis rather than waiting for them to wear out, and that crane inspectors should report directly to the managing director. The fact that this was not already happening concerned many of the delegates – including several major contractors.

“Contractors must understand what a tower crane can, and more importantly can’t, do,” said Ian Wallace of Bovis Lend Lease. He urged both the crane hirers and CPA to help with the situation.

The CPA is looking for feedback from contractors on the draft; copies can be downloaded from the Crane Interest Group section of their website.

Moves are also being made to bolster the role of tower crane operators with the publication by the CPA of a Tower Crane Operator’s Handbook which sets down that the operator must decide when to take a crane out of service because of wind and not be pressurised by site managers to continue working. If that decision is disputed, the operator must contact his employer, the guide states.

The guide can also be downloaded from the CPA website or purchased as hard copies and contains information that could also be useful for site managers.

Recommendations

• Pro-active maintenance
• Maintenance and inspection intervals varied according to site operations
• Qualification of maintenance staff
• Erectors cannot examine cranes they put up
• Clarify whether cranes need re-examination after repair
• Competent person has authority to stop a tower crane.
• In case of any conflict, MD to back the competent person. 
• Competent person to have authority to send reports of an imminent danger to the HSE/Local Authority
• Competent persons not paid by results