Terminal Satellite 3 (S3) is the latest development in the expansion plans for Charles De Gaulle Airport in Paris. As Europe’s second busiest passenger airport handling just under 58 million passengers last year, Charles De Gaulle is preparing to take on London Heathrow within the next five years.

Belgium structural steel work contractor Victor Buyck approached Sharpfibre to begin preliminary discussions in June 2004 following the establishment of a successful partnership on the Barclay’s Bank new UK headquarters project at Canary Wharf.

To deliver a project of this nature, a full understanding of the design and the environmental challenges that face the project team would be fundamental to its success. Sharpfibre flew out its team of specialists to support and chair workshop meetings with project stakeholders to interrogate system designs and testing to select the right products suitable for this environment.

A proactive approach built on the foundations of collaborative working offered ADP and Victor Buyck significant cost savings through early involvement on both the design and delivery of the fire protection for this project. Examples of this include the introduction of a compatible colour pigment into the fire protection. This helped the client reduce his cost plan by almost €10,000 by eliminating the need to subsequently paint our finished works as well as significant time savings on the critical path.

In June 2005 negotiations were concluded and Sharpfibre was awarded the contract to carry out fire protection works and the installation of the metal decking. Fire protection works commenced on the 750 metre long terminal building in August 2005 and completed almost 2 years later in June 2007 on schedule to receive the first landing of the new A380 Airbus attended by Nicolas Sarkozy, the French President. During this time Sharpfibre completed a total of 136,575 hours on site, securing the monthly site safety award on 8 separate occasions beating no fewer than 15 other trade contractors to the coveted prize. Sharpfibre’s contribution in the development of the project was further extended through facilitation of a meeting at Heathrow, between key delegates from the Charles De Gaulle airport security team, ADP, and the T5 security and logistics team at BAA (British Airports Authority); enabling the capture of best practice associated with the implementation of safe and secure systems of entry.

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