Uptime Award Winners 2013 - 39:11
By Daniel Lerick and Nicholas Maki, Hibbing Taconite

Just as there is always a change in seasons, the journey to reliability excellence will continuously be changing and adapting.

Maintaining a facility the size of Hibbing Taconite, a mining and natural resource company, is and always will be challenging. It is an endless cycle of preparing and repairing; continuously moving from one project to the next. It can be rewarding one minute and frustrating the next. As anyone involved with the process can attest, it is harder than it may appear to maintain equipment at its original designed capacity and efficiency. From the moment a piece of equipment is put into service, the clock starts and wear begins. It never seems to end and there appears to be no light at the end of the tunnel. You move from one project to the next, over and over again, seldom taking time to reflect and appreciate the work you have accomplished because the next project is waiting. This is how it is in the maintenance process. We execute repair after repair, continuously planning for the next shift, day, week, month and year, seldom taking time to look back and appreciate the work that has been accomplished.