NHS Scotland

The Client

Since its launch in 1948, the NHS has grown to become the world’s largest publicly funded health service. It is also one of the most efficient, most egalitarian and most comprehensive.
Ninewells is an acute teaching hospital and has strong links with Dundee University Medical School which has one of the world’s leading leukaemia research units. The hospital has 862 acute beds and a 31-bed medical assessment unit. The hospital has two MRI scanners and a CT scanner available, which can be operated 24 hours a day, including weekends. The hospital provides services in accident and emergency, critical care, lung and colorectal cancer, palliative care and has a renal unit.

The Problem

A section of 3” DHW copper pipe had, over the years, been rubbing on its support. Over time this had caused a hole to wear through the wall of the pipe and subsequently began to leak. The pipe was providing DHW to a number of critical wards within the hospital.
The impact of shutting down the system to carry out the works was staggering. As a result the hospital engineers had to look at alternative ways of affecting a repair.
In addition to the urgent repair the hospital estates team had identified a number of existing cast iron valves in the system that had to be replaced due to failure and their unsuitability for the system.
To mitigate any issues with bacterial growth and to maintain services to the ward the hospital approached APS to offer a suitable solution.

The Solution

APS came up with a plan to isolate the line where the repairs had to be affected whilst maintaining the supply of DHW to the critical wards.
This was achieved by installing two mechanical line stops into the pipeline to isolate the section of pipe where the valves had to be replaced and the pipe repaired.
As well as the isolation a temporary bypass was installed around the line stops to maintain the supply to the wards.
LineStopping provides a temporary mechanical isolation on a pipeline to allow repairs to be carried out and when incorporated with the bypass system can still maintain services to the end users.
All this work was carried out outside of normal working hours where demand on the system would be minimal.

Allied Pipefreezing - Project Management - Onsite photo 1

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Key Information

Location:

Timescale :

Nine Wells Hospital, Dundee

2006

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