A major project to supports the retrieval of historic nuclear waste from Sellafield has scooped another top safety award.

Since construction of the Silo Maintenance Facility (SMF) began in October 2013 its commitment to workplace safety and wellbeing has been recognised by several honours, the most recent being the Sellafield CEO Award.

The SMF project, due for completion in December, has also received the Sellafield Safety Performance Award over four consecutive years.

The project delivery team has also this year collected a Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents Commended Award and has reached the milestone of three million working hours without an on-site lost time incident.

Dave McCaul, health and safety manager for Balfour Beatty which is delivering the project with Cavendish Nuclear, said: “The key to our success is that we have all worked together to deliver this substantial five-year project with an embedded safety culture, for which our award-wining team have rightfully been recognised within the industry."

Mike Higgins, Cavendish Nuclear commissioning manager, added: “From my first day on the SMF project it was clear to see that the ‘safety first’ culture is in the very DNA of the entire workforce.

“The commitment to safety is demonstrated by collective leadership and responsibility by the whole project team.

"It is inspiring to see that the project’s strong health and safety performance has been recognised by the multiple safety awards we have won”.