An airport is often the first introduction to the country. A good airport would signal a new India, committed to join the ranks of modern industrialised nations,” said Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh during the inaugural address. Making a committed effort to maintain the cleaning standards at all times is one of the major impediments for India’s progress. Keeping the T3 clean is a challenge for everyone associated with it. In fact, the cleaning and maintenance of T3 began much before it commenced operations. Three years back, when this project began, multiple contractors were working simultaneously to complete the Terminal within the stipulated time of 39 months. At the time when the floors were being laid, the lighting connections being fitted, the elevator shafts being designed… the cleaning had begun. For the first time many of the construction contractors found it impossible to continue working without cleaning the surface area they were working on. Parallel construction on a single site is a modern development which ensues completion of time-bound projects. Debris and blocks of wet cement made their way into the various systems being installed, forcing the contractors to constantly clean the area. This was where an industrial vacuum cleaner came to their rescue and for the first time construction contractors found the necessity to clean and also use a cleaning machine at the project stage. The use of vacuum cleaners for purposes other than housekeeping and industrial has opened up new markets for cleaning equipment. Many of the equipment bought at the time of construction are now being shifted for use at other projects or are being used for maintenance at T3.
“We have not outsourced the maintenance of the conveyor belts as yet. We identified few of our workers, who were at work during the installation, for the maintenance operations. Dulevo provided the necessary training to operate the machine. Even though, there could be discrepancies in the handling of these machines by our workers as they are not from the cleaning or maintenance field, it is important that our own
In the case of T3, the installation of the systems began even before the entire building was erected. Hence, there was much dust all around which required constant cleaning. “We had to engage in both manual and mechanised cleaning using a heavy
This is the first airport project of ThyssenKrupp where industrial vacuum cleaners are being used to keep the project site clean. “In the future too in such projects we would be looking at using cleaning machines. Earlier, we used blowers but it is not possible to do so at T3, as it will spread the dust all over and with most of the areas being carpeted, industrial vacs are ideal.”
“Cleaning equipment has come in handy and had speeded up our cleaning processes, especially with the time constraint we had for commissioning. Cleaning has always been bothering us and this time the industrial vacs and escalator cleaning machines have eased up our job. We will be handing over the cleaning machines to the service provider who would be doing the cleaning part.”
Apart from direct purchase of industrial vacuum cleaners for project cleaning by GMR, Forbes Pro machines like RS501 vacuum ride on sweeper, CS110 ride on sweeper, CS70 ride on compact sweeper; high pressure cleaning machines and GS-83 industrial vacuum cleaner have been deployed at T3.
Another major record created at T3 is the service contract being awarded to multiple agencies. Five service contractors – All Services Under One Roof, A2Z Infrastructure, Lion Services, Impressions and Updater Services besides Appletree which will be maintaining the façade. While Sonia Gandhi asked during the inauguration of T3 ‘Can we keep it clean?’, Dr Manmohan Singh said, the new Terminal which has brought together several service providers will prove their capacity to coordinate across agencies… and work as a united team.
The Terminal 3 of the Indira Gandhi International Airport that went on stream in July has opened up the floodgates for the Indian Cleaning Industry. While the infrastructure itself has established new global benchmarks in India, the massive structure spread over 5.4 million sqft has created immense opportunities for the cleaning industry too.