Landfill News

RoSPA Occupational Health and Safety Award - Gold
April 2011

Magpie Environmental Drilling Services Ltd, of Newcastle upon Tyne, has won a Gold award in the prestigious RoSPA Occupational Health and Safety Awards 2011.

The Gold award will be presented at a ceremony at the Hilton Birmingham Metropole Hotel, at the National Exhibition Centre, on Wednesday, 18 May, 2011.

The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents (RoSPA), a safety charity, launched its awards programme 55 years ago. The scheme looks not only at accident records, but also entrants’ overarching health and safety management systems, including important practices such as strong leadership and workforce involvement.

David Rawlins, RoSPA’s awards manager, said: “RoSPA firmly believes that organisations that have demonstrated their commitment to continuous improvement in accident and ill health prevention deserve recognition. Magpie Environmental Drilling Services Ltd has shown that it is committed to striving for such continuous improvement and we are delighted to honour it through the presentation of an award.”

Gary Raffle, Magpie Environmental Drilling Services, Managing Director, said "It is a huge honour to receive the RoSPA Gold Award, we achieved the Silver Award at the first attempt and we have now achieved the Gold Award". Gary also said “Although winning awards for health and safety helps to demonstrate our commitment, we are not complacent and we will always strive to continually improve our health and safety management system to ensure we maintain and improve our standards to the highest levels as well as aiming to reduce and minimise accidents, incidents and ill health in the workplace”.





RoSPA Occupational Health and Safety Award - Silver
March 2009

Magpie Environmental Drilling Services Ltd. is celebrating winning a RoSPA Occupational Health and Safety Award (Silver category). The Silver award will be presented at a special ceremony at the Birmingham Hilton Metropole Hotel at the National Exhibition Centre, on Wednesday, May 13. The ceremony will take place alongside the Safety and Health Expo 2009, Europe’s leading annual health and safety at work exhibition.

David Rawlins, RoSPA Awards Manager, said: "Magpie Environmental Drilling Services Ltd. has shown a commitment to protecting the health and well-being of its employees and others". Entering the RoSPA Awards reinforces the message that good health and safety is good for business and clearly demonstrates an organisation’s dedication to improving performance in this crucial area”.

Gary Raffle, Magpie Environmental Drilling Services, Managing Director, said "It is a huge honour to receive the RoSPA Silver Award, this is the first year that we have entered for a RoSPA Award, and to achieve the Silver award straight away is very encouraging". Gary also said “The award scheme reinforces our dedication and investment in health and safety and having excellent health and safety management systems in place".





New Addition to the Fleet
October 2007

Latest innovative addition to the fleet. Magpie are proud to present the purchase of the Comacchio MC3000 HC to an already impressive fleet. Following a robust design process between Magpie and Comacchio, the MC3000 HC is based upon the remarkable MC3000 as the base unit, but has been augmented by larger high grip tracks and a ground anchor allowing it to drill on slopes up to a designed maximum of 35o. The outstanding aspect of this innovative design is that the drill mast has retained its ability to drill with 10m rods therefore not reducing its working efficiency.





New Operations Manager
October 2007

Phil Keeble has joined Magpie as Operations Manager. Phil comes from the MOD where he worked for the Royal Engineers within the Special Team section facilitating the drilling and installation of ground water extraction wells and site investigations around the world. He brings with him many abilities including operational expertise, logistical management and Health, Safety and Environment qualifications. Phil is eager to provide the operational support to our drilling crews on the ground and ensure that Magpies high working standards are maintained during this sustained period of strong organic growth.





New Contracts Manager
August 2007

Michael Moggeridge has joined Magpie as Contracts Manager. Michael, a Geologist by trade, arrives from SLR Consulting, one of the UK’s leading Environmental Consultancies where he spent 7 years working within environmental engineering team. He brings with him a wealth of quality assurance expertise, contractual knowledge and Construction Health and Safety experience that are directly applicable to all of Magpies business areas. Michael is looking forward to the opportunities offered by a company rapidly expanding through organic growth underpinned by its excellent reputation for quality and service.





New MC3000 rolled out

Magpie Drilling has continued its expansion with a further MC3000 added to the drilling rig fleet. Following the increase in customer demand for deeper, larger diameter wells, with temporary and permanent steel casings, the need for increased power, higher torque, and superior depth capabilities are paramount.

The new machine has an extra rod in the carousel enabling it to drill 60m without any crew member ever having to handle a drill rod. A new design for the self extruding barrel has increased the power in which the pusher plate operates making the extrusion process faster and more efficient.





Magpie secure deep groundwater monitoring project in South Wales.

We are pleased to announce the award for the three groundwater monitoring boreholes at Trecatti Landfill Site, Merthyr Tydfil. The Biffa owned site is currently undertaking a series of drilling projects to ascertain water quality in the natural ground surrounding this enormous landfill. The three wells will be drilled to various depths up to 225m, with a 4” plastic liner. The drilling will be complicated by the likelihood of numerous coal seam workings in this heavily mined area. Magpie looks forward to the challenge and has invested in the latest overburden drill and case system to tackle the potential formation difficulties.





“Deepest” leachate retro drills in Leicestershire

SITA UK approached Magpie with one of the most challenging landfill drilling projects undertaken to date. Enderby Warren a closed landfill site in Leicestershire has existing leachate extraction chambers 74m deep. SITA wanted to retro drill some chambers adjacent to the existing chambers as a back-up to the wells. Magpie were contracted to drill two wells to an estimated target depth of 75m. To our knowledge this had not been achieved before in landfill in the UK. We completed the first well in just under two weeks, and on the second visit completed the second well in a week. This included drilling of the wells in 450/350mm diameters, with a double permanent steel installation. 406mm steel was installed to 50m and 273mm steel installed to final depth.





More New Machines for 2006

Our policy in the past has been to reinvest in machinery and technology to enhance our service we offer our customers. This has involved the purchase of new, bespoke drilling rigs every year. 2006 will be no exception.
Following the success of our recently introduced Comacchio MC 3000’s we have placed an order for an additional machine. This unit will be fitted with a casing advancing system, enabling us to cope with the increased demand from clients for the installation of temporary/permanent steel casing.

A further requirement for our customers is drilling on steep gradients. Planned new additions to our fleet will be specialist “hill climbing” Comacchio rigs, able to set-up on locations only accessible previously by extensive platform building, installation of additional haul roads, etc at great expense to the client. The rigs are being designed with several extra safety features to facilitate manoeuvring in these difficult situations and will enhance the services we can provide to our customers.





Probing Technique Developed to Ascertain Basal Levels

With the current PPC regulations in place, most landfill sites require leachate extraction and monitoring wells installed to the base of each cell. With older sites information on base liners can be vague at best, and even in new cells with modern survey data, clients are still hesitant of drilling close to basal liners.

Following discussions with our clients, we have developed a probing technique to help ascertain the base levels on individual cells. The system works in conjunction with the drilling operation. A well is drilled to a “safe” stand off point from the estimated base levels, (normally 2m). The tools are withdrawn from the well and the probing device lowered in. The system has an exterior casing with the probe running inside it. The probe is percussively driven into the ground in nominally 300mm increments. The probe is withdrawn leaving it’s temporary casing at the level reached. The sample can be examined at the surface, and the process repeated until the desired material is intersected, (usually the gravel drainage layer). Once this information is obtained, the probing system can be withdrawn and the drilling tools re-entered into the well with a definitive final drilling depth.

This system not only offers additional security to the client when drilling close to the base liner, but proves a large financial saving as the investigation is undertaken at the same time as the drilling, at very little additional cost.