Mincivil, contractor of the project together with Topco S.A., is using deep foundation machines from Liebherr to install the piles for the bridges. Piles with diameters of 1500 mm down to depths of 26 m were made by the drilling rig LB 36 using the Kelly drilling method, and piles with diameters of 600 mm and depths of 33 m were made by the piling and drilling rig LRB 355 using full displacement drilling equipment. By the end of the work the Columbian company had drilled a total of 57,000 m into the deep. While the LB 36 completed its work in December 2017, the LRB 355 will be operating until March 2019.
On looking closely at the piling and drilling rig there is a surprise. A young woman smiles from the operator’s cabin: Thirty-two-year-old Adriana Gómez Beltrán has been machine operator on the LRB 355 since January 2018. The first woman in the whole of Colombia to take the controls of a drilling rig. And probably one of only a few in this branch worldwide. Adriana has passed the endurance test with the LRB 355!