CULTURE OF TRUST AND RESPECT PROMOTES SAFETY

Given the rarity of compliments, Max Schellenbach was really happy to receive the letter from the diving team on the SAAone project (see box). The letter is about how they don’t cut any corners in terms of costs or effort when it comes to operating properly and safely. ‘Everyone involved deserves a feather in their cap. Management meetings are working especially well and everything on the work floor is NINA-compliant without being intrusive. The NINA concept really works. Everyone draws everyone else’s attention to behavior that’s against the rules, but without being arrogant. People appreciate it if their unsafe actions are pointed out to them.’

FIGHT
Bart Cassiers has been a diver for Smit and now Boskalis for 32 years. Together with Raymondo De Kramer, John Engel and Michiel Deckers, he took the initiative to write the letter. “As a diver, you often have to fight to get facilities. For example, it’s alegal requirement for a diving team to consist of at least 3 divers. We can also ask for a fourth diver if the diving site has a lot of obstacles, for example, and there is a real chance of someone getting stuck.
Normally, you have to beg, but this time everything was automatic: a fourth diver had already been arranged in advance.”

THINK ABOUT YOUR OWN ACTIONS
Mutual trust and respect are therefore present and that has a positive impact on the working atmosphere, says Bart. “Thanks to NINA, there’s a lot of talk about safety in a way that gets you thinking about your own behavior. In the past, if you told someone he wasn’t wearing a hard hat, you would get a load of verbal abuse in return. Nowadays, you get a genuine ‘thank you’. It was the first time I saw that everyone is complying with the safety regulations.”

WHAT ARE THE DIVERS DOING IN THE SAAONE INFRASTRUCTURE PROJECT?
The object of the SAAone project is to build a large aqueduct. The ground was injected with grout to create a waterproof layer for the foundations. However, this
proved insufficient and the aqueduct under construction ended up under water, along with all the equipment, such as cranes, containers and scaffolding. Divers were therefore brought in to disassemble and remove obstacles, to pour a concrete floor under water and to assist with reinjection of the underlayer.