The Federation of Piling Specialists (FPS) has issued a Guidance Document that is designed to highlight situations where piling rigs can become unstable through over-flighting during Continuous Flight Auger (CFA) piling.
The document, which is available for download from the FPS website www.fps.org.uk, is aimed at piling contractors; geotechnical designers; planning supervisors and others involved with the specification, selection and procurement of CFA piling. It provides background information to the flighting mechanism, helping identify some of the situations where the risk of over-flighting is likely to occur.

In addition, the Guidance Document details some of the options that are available to piling specialists and presents best practice that can help reduce the risk of rig instability and further enhance safety of operations on-site.
Speaking about the Guidance Document, Martin Blower, Chairman FPS said: “CFA piling is widely used and there have been a number of notable rig overturns recently. What this document does is raise wider awareness of the potential risks of over-flighting, loss of support and stability of the working platform that may result in a piling rig or attendant crane overturning. More importantly, the document encourages robust risk management and the controls to be implemented to mitigate such risk.”

The document is not intended to replace the requirements to use competent supervision and operatives when undertaking CFA piling, but as an additional information source offering guidance.
Martin added: “Safety is fundamentally important and we [FPS] encourage all those involved in CFA piling to look at the Guidance Document and circulate it widely to all those actively participating either in the specification or the delivery of CFA piling on sites.”