KELLER keeps running projects safely despite the COVID-19 outburst Featured

Keller teams across the world are doing everything they can to mitigate the impact of the coronavirus outbreak and keep projects running safely wherever possible.

In certain cases, Keller Colleagues have to travel extraordinary lengths to reach the working sites. Over the past few weeks, skilled workers from Austria, Italy, Greece, Poland and Estonia have helped ensure key infrastructure projects in Scandinavia can go ahead – despite some logistically complicated journeys.

The projects they’ve been working on include the West Link rail tunnel under central Gothenburg, where Keller is carrying out deep soil mixing, jet grouting and uplift anchors; and a railway construction project in the Norwegian city of Moss.

Despite Norway and Sweden have been impacted by the COVID-19 outburst, construction works in major infrastructure projects did not halt. Keller shares equipment and resources across EMEA (Europe, the Middle East and Africa) so the expert workers are needed to support that. “Normally they would work two weeks on, one week off, but in this situation they’ve said they’re happy to stay here for six to eight weeks without going home if need be. I’m proud of the way the Keller family has pulled together so we can meet obligations. Other contractors here haven’t been able to react this way and for us, it’s about showing our clients they have the right partner. We talk a lot about global strength and local focus at Keller, but this shows we can live up to that – even in the most difficult situations,” Robert Thurner, General Manager for Sweden and Norway, stated.

The pandemic has also affected operations in Australia. Flight cancellations have made difficult for some Keller employees to get to their project sites.

Last month, seven colleagues from Brisbane, Queensland boarded a coach to begin a lengthy, 26-hour journey to various sites in Melbourne, Victoria. “They’d been working in Victoria before Easter and we were monitoring the situation closely,” explains Keller Australia’s Operations Director Tony Lansdown. “Things were changing fast with state border closures, but we’d been assured that if they went home to Queensland, they’d be able to get back again, as construction is considered essential. So they went home – and during the break the return flights were canceled.”

Since multiple projects are ongoing in Victoria, Keller must be able to move expert workers there. The workers were happy to go back to Melbourne via coach – despite the approximately 1,700km journey. The 48-seater coach gave everyone plenty of room to space out and hand sanitizer was on board. To ensure the employees’ safety, the drivers swapped out at various intervals.