Visors, heat maps and quadruple the cleaning: How JLR engine plant is easing back to life
Jaguar Land Rover's giant engine manufacturing centre on Wolverhampton's i54 Business Park has been gradually coming back to life after the luxury car group operations due to coronavirus.
The first diesel and petrol engines were beginning to come off the assembly line on Friday
Awakening the plant after the hibernation has been a tough task for management who have had to put in place a myriad of new measures to ensure that the workforce can work in safety and social distancing is carefully observed.
Operations director Kevin Wood, who started in his role in January, said that the management team had come back full time a fortnight ago.
"We spent a lot of time making sure that the plant was closed down correctly because no one knew how long it would have to stay closed for. We went to great lengths to make sure the production facility and product on the line would still be acceptable when we returned.
"At the time in March we were just beginning to think about social distancing and since then we have been working from home," he explained.
Mr Wood said that he and manufacturing leader Craig Osman had been learning all the rules and requirements from the Public Health Agency and JLR's own central steering committee.
"In the last two weeks we have been putting it into practice with 10 to 15 people who came back in early.
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"We set about looking at how it would affect the 'day in the life' of an associate at the engine manufacturing centre.
"We have painstakingly taken a look at every step an associate would take from the moment of arriving at the front gate to the moment of leaving the plant," he stressed.
Heat map
They looked at what was needed in the car park and entrance and exit points and reconfigured the entrances to the plant as entrance only and exit only to avoid contact between people coming and going.
"We have done the obvious things, such as marking two-metre spaces at all entrance and exit points as visual cues to ensure safe queueing to get in, and installed heat cameras.
"Everyone arriving on site gets a heat map and the business protection team will play back to them what their temperature is. If it exceeds 37.4C they will be asked to stand in an area for five to 10 minutes to do a re-test so we don't get any false fails," said Mr Wood.
Social distancing measures have been applied to toilets and rest areas and four-seat tables have had all but one seats removed or they have been bagged to ensure people don't sit next to each other.
In some areas each table or chair has a name assigned to it and cleaning materials are also provided for people to clean after them.
"This is on top of quadrupling the amount of cleaning we are doing," Mr Wood explained.
JLR is also promoting self help as well and Mr Wood says that the measures that have been taken ultimately rely on people behaving responsibly.
On Thursday more than 100 people returned for an induction and when the inductions are completed about 50 per cent of the workforce will be back at work.
The machining areas were the first to get back into operation with the assembly area starting up in earnest on Friday.
"We are bringing back the right amount of people at the right time to build the product with safety paramount.
"It will be a fluid process and the numbers working will depend on what the demand for engines is," added Mr Wood, who said each employee at a work station was receiving a half-hour long induction including a demonstration of changes in practices, an explanation of what has been done for them and what steps they need to take.
"We are issuing 100 per cent hand sanitiser bottles to each associate to take away from the induction and they can also have a JLR-made visor if they wish.
"It is all about putting people at ease. We were both apprehensive on the first day back, but the team has done an awful lot of work to mitigate any risk."
Visors and face masks
Mr Osman said that the key on the work stations was to enforce social distancing and making them as safe as possible.
"We have around 150 work stations on the assembly lines and were asked to make them Covid-19 compliant and started with a standard risk assessment process," he outlined.
For each station any physical hazards have been eliminated and 120 screens have been made and put in place where it was not possible to achieve two-metre distancing between associates.
Each associate is also being offered the opportunity to have a visor or face mask to give them confidence to come to work.
"Not one has asked for a visor so far," he said.
Across the assembly lines the team had to risk assess 350 operations
"It is all about keeping our workforce safe in their working environment which has been changed significantly," added Mr Osman.
Mr Wood said it had been apparent from the inductions conducted so far that some people were still apprehensive about returning to work.
"We have all gone through different experiences over the last eight to nine weeks and many of us know someone who has had the virus or have lost someone. We have a great support network in JLR and we will be making sure people have got full support to help them coming back to work and outside work," he pointed out.
Where possible office staff will continue to work from home, but those who have to come in to the plant have also had safety measures put in place
Through the closure a small team of around 20 has been carrying out testing work and checking equipment at the EMC, which normally employs more than 1,000.
The experience of getting the EMC back up and running and the measures taken will also be fed back to the wider JLR group and will help in getting the car plants back in action too.
"I am really proud of what we have done. We have really worked hard and there is now a real buzz about the place.
"It has tested us, but so far so good," said Mr Wood.
