TopLift 2025: ten at the top

Prepare to cast your IC TopLift contest vote for 2025 by reviewing our selection of ten spectacular lifting projects chosen as contenders from the last 12 months. Just email me: [email protected] your vote entry number, your name, company name and contact details, please. Or you can use the pdf voting form at the bottom of the story.

Fully completed votes may be entered into a draw for a chance to win an as-yet undetermined prize.

Yes, it is all a bit of fun but there is a serious amount of value and prestige in being voted an IC TopLift winner so be sure to submit a vote. All I ask is please don’t vote for your own company or the one you work for.

The 2025 TopLift winner and runners up will be announced in the November December issue of ICST magazine.

ENTRY 1 IC TopLift 2025

ENTRY 1

Heavy handling

Equipment: Tadano Demag CC 9800, Liebherr LR 12500-1.0, TP Handler

Equipment user: Sarens

Location: Netherlands

Sarens handled massive transition pieces weighing 750 tonnes each and monopiles each weighing 1,500 tonnes, for the He Dreiht Offshore Wind Park in the Netherlands. To manage complex client interfaces, Sarens said, it operated around the clock, using high performance cranes, including Liebherr LR 12500-1.0 and Tadano Demag CC 9800 lattice boom crawler cranes. Sarens’ in-house 750 tonne TP Handler enhanced efficiency and played a crucial role in maintaining the schedule.

ENTRY 2 IC TopLift 2025. Photo: Reuters

ENTRY 2

Raising a superyacht

Equipment: Hebo Lift 10, Hebo Lift 2

Equipment user: Hebo Maritiemservice, TMC Marine

Location: Italy

Super heavy lift floating crane Hebo Lift 10, owned by Hebo Maritiemservice in the Netherlands, was used to raise the sunken superyacht Bayesian from the seabed off the coast of Sicily. Hebo’s 2,200 tonne capacity sheerlegs vessel, previously known as Taklift 4, lifted the 540 tonne, 56 metre-long and 11.5 metre-wide yacht on 21 June. It was 10 months after it sank in bad weather.

The smaller multipurpose crane barge Hebo Lift 2, carrying a lattice boom crane, assisted with the salvage operation. With the yacht out of the water the hull was pumped out and Bayesian was carried to port before being lifted on to a specially manufactured steel cradle at the quayside.

ENTRY 3 IC TopLift 2025

ENTRY 3

Chemical giants

Equipment: Zoomlion ZCC89000 lattice boom crawler crane

Equipment user: Zoomlion

Location: China

A 3,600 tonne capacity Zoomlion ZCC89000 lattice boom crawler crane claimed more world lifting records on a chemical plant construction project in China. The double boom crane lifted three giant chemical processing vessels, the heaviest of which weighed more than 3,000 tonnes. Zoomlion claimed two world records, one for the heaviest single lift and the other for the fastest lifting speed.

ENTRY 4 IC TopLift 2025

ENTRY 4

Delicate handling

Equipment: Tadano CC 38.650-1 lattice crawler, Demag AC 140 all terrain crane

Equipment user: Toggenburger

Location: Switzerland

Switzerland-based Toggenburger used a Tadano CC 38.650-1 lattice boom crawler crane with a 66 metre boom to lift and place the 230 tonne Aabachbrücke bridge in Niederuster. The bridge’s parallelogram shape and sensitivity required precise load distribution, achieved through strand jacks that controlled individual lines to prevent structural damage.

The crane was assembled in two and a half days. Erection was assisted by a Demag AC 140 all terrain crane and 20 trucks transporting components to the site. The lift involved manoeuvring over challenging terrain and setting the bridge down with precision.

ENTRY 5 IC TopLift 2025

ENTRY 5

Power pair

Equipment: Grove GMK5150XL all terrain cranes x2

Equipment user: Southern Cranes and Access

Location: south east UK

As part of a major engineering works project, Southern Cranes and Access used two Grove GMK5150XL all terrain cranes in a tandem lifting operation to install a 22 tonne substation at London Gatwick Airport.

To avoid suspending any flights, all work had to be carried out below a height of 25 metres. The substation needed eight lifting points so just using one crane would have required an extra longitudinal lifting beam, adding to the lift height. Using two cranes avoided this. Working with the full 44.5 tonnes of counterweight, at a maximum radius of 22 metres, the substation was simultaneously lifted and positioned.

ENTRY 6 IC TopLift 2025

ENTRY 6

Mega Mammoet

Equipment: Mega Jack 5200, SPMT

Equipment user: Mammoet

Location: Netherlands

Mammoet was instrumental in getting the jack-up type drill rig Noble Regina Allen repaired as soon as possible to minimise downtime. Mammoet initially planned to use a PTC210 ring crane, lifting from above. Instead, it chose to jack up the 22,000 tonne rig from underneath using Mammoet’s Mega Jack 5200 system.

Quick mobilisation and assembly in 7 days instead of the usual 15 were key to fit the project schedule. Six Mega Jack towers, each with a capacity of 5,200 tonnes, lifted the rig to a height of 35 metres. In two halves the replacement 70 metre leg was brought in on SPMT and lifted using the rig’s jacking mechanism before the second half which was then welded to the first.

ENTRY 7 IC TopLift 2025

ENTRY 7

Troubled bridges

Equipment: Enerpac JS-250 jack up lifting system

Equipment user: Autokrane Schares

Location: Berlin, Germany

German heavy lift contractor Autokrane Schares used a system of automated hydraulic jacks to safely remove the 60 metre long Marggraff canal bridge in Berlin, Germany in preparation for its replacement. The 60 year old bridge weighed 1,500 tonnes and was hemmed in among road intersections, railway tracks and overhead power lines.

Schares used hydraulic Enerpac JS-250 jack-up systems under two points of the bridge on land. Two floating pontoons carried the others for the other two lifting points for each of three sections weighing between 450 and 630 tonnes.

With the jacking system synchronised one operator could lift the bridge evenly and in balance. Having lifted the bridge sections it was moved laterally, floated to the side of the canal and lowered onto self-propelled modular transporter (SPMT) which then transported them by road to a nearby site for dismantling.

ENTRY 8 IC TopLift 2025

ENTRY 8

Turbine tracks

Equipment: Liebherr LTR 11200

Equipment user: Smith Crane and Construction

Location: New Zealand

SCC used its largest crane, a 1,200 tonne capacity Liebherr LTR 11200 telescopic boom crawler crane, to erect turbines at the new Harapaki wind farm in the Hawke’s Bay region of New Zealand. To lift the wind turbine’s nacelle the crane was in T3YV2VEN configuration with 40.6 metres of main boom, 20.2 metre extension and a 36 metre luffing jib.

ENTRY 9 IC TopLift 2025

ENTRY 9

Go for Stack!

Bragg accomplished a feat never attempted outside a NASA facility by installing the Space Shuttle Endeavour in the vertical blast-off configuration

Equipment: Liebherr LR 1750 crawler, LTM 1400 wheeled mobile, Enerpac Cube Jack, Goldhofer SPMT, J&R Power Rotator

Equipment user: Bragg Companies

Location: California, USA

Bragg Companies relocated the Space Shuttle Endeavour, two solid rocket boosters and the external tank-94 from storage to a new air and space centre for the vertical Go for Stack exhibit. Many challenges had to be overcome, including working out new lifting points with a lack of accurate information, a crowded jobsite next to a school, trees, elevation changes, the list goes on.

The ET-94 booster was 47 metres long, 8.4 metres in diameter and weighed 30 tonnes. Endeavour stood 18 metres tall, 37 metres long, had a 24 metre wingspan and weighed 80 tonnes.

ENTRY 10 IC TopLift 2025

ENTRY 10

Turbine record

Equipment: XCMG XGC88000 lattice crawler crane

Location: Yingkou city, China

A 4,000 tonne capacity lattice boom crawler crane from XCMG in China was used to assemble an 18 MW wind turbine weighing 800 tonnes, setting another lifting record, according to the manufacturer. It was the crane’s first lift in the offshore wind energy industry. The offshore turbine in the eastern coastal city had a hub height of 145 metres and it was nearly 270 metres from the ground to the tip of the rotor.

In addition to the weight of the load, top challenges on the project were the height of the lift and the precision required for accurate placement atop the tower. A further critical element of the operation was to install the three rotor blades, each 126 metres long.