Irish Water's Cork Lower Harbour Main Drainage Project has marked a significant milestone this week.

The project, which sees Ward and Burke Group extend the local sewer network, has now reached 250,000 hours worked without a Lost Time Injury in over two years.

The contractor has built over 14km of new sewer pipes and six new pumping stations in the busy roads and streets of Carrigaline, Ringaskiddy, Passage West and Monkstown and connected Ringaskiddy, Passage West and Monkstown to the Shanbally Wastewater Treatment Plant. 

A proactive safety culture has been promoted within the Cork Lower Main Drainage Project. This culture of safety has been enthusiastically championed by Ward and Burke, Employers Representative and Resident Engineering team, throughout the many construction challenges of the project. This included innovations such as constructing the pumping station in the Monkstown Bosun Car Park, the largest box caisson to be constructed and then sunken underground in Ireland. The pumping station is the equivalent size of a large two-storey house. It was constructed to full height within the carpark and then sunk underground to maintain the carpark and minimise the impact of the pumping station in the area.

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"Safety is at the heart of everything that Irish Water does, the involvement and commitment of everybody working on this project has been essential to ensure that we delivered these necessary works safely," said Deaglan Healy Project Manager for the Cork Lower Harbour Project. "We have worked almost half a million hours without a reportable accident on the project to date, having constructed the Shanbally Wastewater Treatment Plant and pipelines and pumping stations on the south side of the harbour so that wastewater from Ringaskiddy, Crosshaven, Carrigaline, Passage West and Monkstown is now being treated. No job is so important that it can't be done safely, and we bring this ethos to the other works now started in Cobh as part of the Cork Lower Harbour Project."

"Safety is at the core of our organisation," commented Padraig Burke Director of Ward and Burke Construction Limited. "We are delighted with this recognition of our commitment to safety. We are passionate about raising safety standards in the construction industry through investment in our people, our systems of work and encouraging new entrants in to the industry through traineeship programmes, apprenticeships, and third level institutions. This focus on safety allows us, as a turnkey design and build contractor with a direct labour force to manage risk and deliver projects safely for our workers, our clients and the public."

(CM/JG)