On the road with Steven and Ricardo, the two are part of the RTS story
They are 37 years old and have been very good friends for over 20 years. Steven is a trained metalworker and welder. He got the idea that industrial climbing could be something for him through façade construction. He also infected Ricardo, who worked as an educator before. Together they both started working in offshore wind energy.
What is special about the well-coordinated team is that they have been involved in the development of the rotor blade division at RTS since 2014, right from the start: Marvin Benker, who took over as head of the new rotor blade project department in October 2013, received the first orders and the rope team Steven and Ricardo carried them out at the wind farm. This sounds unexciting at first, but in reality it was a huge challenge for everyone. The task was to place RTS Wind AG on the market as a service provider in the rotor blade sector. Above all, the trust of the customers had to be won, and this can only be achieved through successfully completed orders and the resulting follow-up orders. The situation demanded a high degree of commitment, flexibility and quality awareness from everyone involved.
The teams of the rotor blade project department started in 2014 from our RTS office in Austria. Here, the two FISAT Level 3 climbers worked for almost two years, carrying out orders from customers and training new rope access technicians bit by bit. It was not until the third year (2017) that the rotor blade unit in Austria was so well established that the team of two could return to Germany to work from here.
The diversity of jobs in the wind farms excites both of them
Nacelle gluing, nacelle and tower cleaning, corrusion protection, surface work, floodlighting inspection, platform inspection, lightning protection measurement, mounting and dismounting of blade components, repairs and much more. All of this is work that is carried out on the wind turbine “from the rope”. And this is only a small excerpt of the manual and mechanical work performed by the rope access technicians. A great help here is the “rope moped” which works with an electronic winch and can be used to abseil down and – more importantly – climb up the tower. This saves a lot of time and energy and is now used as standard at RTS.
The jobs take place all over Europe, a fact that both Steven and Ricardo appreciate, because they like to travel internationally.
Familiar team
“The cooperation between the office and the technicians runs optimally in our department,” they both say. “It almost feels like family,” confirms Bilal from project management. Over the course of the last eight years, a division of tasks has emerged: Ricardo is learning new colleagues/colleagues in the rope and would like to go deeper into HSE management/PSA testing in perspective. Steven is involved in site and team coordination, especially keeping an eye on the time and budget plan, and he also trains the rope access technicians on the “rope moped”. A good perspective for both of them and for RTS, because the bigger the department gets and the more teams are created, the more know-how is needed.
- Anyone who would like to become part of the team is welcome to apply at any time!
A driving licence, ability to work at heights and the willingness to work across Europe are important.
Craftsmanship and knowledge of surface treatment are an advantage.
We look forward to receiving CVs to this e-mail: bewerbung@rts-wind.de
