Posted on August 3, 2022
Each year at its annual Summit & Expo, the Western Dredging Association (WEDA) Safety Commission takes pride in presenting awards acknowledging projects and companies that demonstrate outstanding safety awareness. This year two Safety Excellence Awards were presented: Excellence for a Dredging Project and Excellence for a Dredging Contractor. The winners were announced at the WEDA Summit & Expo held from July 25 to 28, 2022, in Houston, Texas.
WEDA’s 2022 Safety Excellence Award for a Dredging Project was presented to the Project Team of Foth Infrastructure and Environment, LLC and Roen Salvage Company for the 2021 Fincantieri Marinette Marine Project in Marinette, Wisconsin. – View Award
The Fincantieri Marinette Marine (FMM) project involved the removal of approximately 95,000 CY of sediment and bedrock to accommodate an updated ship lift footprint and provide additional mooring capacity for FMM. Foth and Roen completed the job while maintaining safe blasting and dredging practices within shipyard boundaries and along the Menominee River. The project incurred zero misfires out of 67 blasts performed and zero injuries in 23,900 work-hours.
On the project, safety was not something “owned” by safety management but was the responsibility of all employees. Team members demonstrated their commitment to safety through multiple forms of communication with heavy equipment and blasting operators, such as eye contact and hand signals and maintenance of the safety radius through group texts and patrol boats equipped with flashing lights and loudhailers.
WEDA’s 2022 Safety Excellence Award for a Dredging Contractor was presented to J.F. Brennan Company, Inc. headquartered in La Crosse, Wisconsin. – View Award
As a fourth-generation, family-owned marine construction firm, J.F. Brennan Company, Inc. (Brennan) understands the importance of a strong safety culture.
With an all-inclusive, employee-driven safety culture, Brennan colleagues demonstrate genuine concern for one another. Every decision made directly affects the safety of the individual and their coworkers—it is their job to collectively provide all employees the knowledge, tools, resources, and support they need to make the right choices every day.
For the past three years, Brennan’s TRIR (Total Recordable Incident Rate) and DART (“days away, restricted or transferred,” a safety metric mandated by OSHA) have exceeded industry standards, and the company has been nationally certified as a Great Place to WorkTM.
These prize-winners exceeded the criteria and made outstanding contributions to meeting WEDA’s safety philosophy, best reflected in these words: “Demanding personal accountability for safe performance is truly the greatest gift an employer can give; it is the ultimate demonstration of care and concern for the well-being of each member of a project team on each and every project.”
