Rising from the ashes

A new chapter is added in the history books of Highveld Steel. On June 6 ArcelorMittal South Africa and Highveld Structural Mill Proprietary Limited (HSM), a subsidiary of Evraz Highveld Steel & Vanadium, have officially restarted the heavy section steel mill.

Highveld Steel and Vanadium will now be known as Highveld Industrial Park. On the day of this historical restart, men who had put in years of hard labour at Highveld shared the moment with members of the press, dignitaries and former colleagues. One of the men who stood watching as the old lady moaned and groaned and then spat out one steel structure after the other was Mervyn van Rooyen, a retired engineer with 37 years experience at Highveld. He started working there in January 1968 and retired in 2004.

“It was with more than a little nostalgia that I drove home from the official opening of the new Highveld Industrial Park. A team of dedicated and enthusiastic professionals, semi-professionals and workers are resurrecting this wonderful old giant that was once the backbone and lifeblood of the former Witbank for decades,” Mervyn said.

Over its forty odd years of life Highveld facilitated and developed the careers of, not hundreds, but thousands of young people. It provided exceptional training both on and off the job. An average of 200 apprentices
went through the well-equipped training centre every year, many of them going on to study further at Highveld’s cost. Bursaries were awarded to deserving students and one wonders how many graduates were launched on their
careers thanks to Highveld.

The story goes on and on, but one asks, “What was it like to work there?”
For an answer one should have a look at the Facebook site ‘Highveld Steel & Vanadium Corp Ltd Friends’. The nostalgia and gratitude on these pages tells the whole story. Certainly for the vast majority, working at Highveld was an honour and a massively rewarding experience.

“Throughout the years Highveld had an excellent management team who promoted a wonderful team spirit through hard work. And, I mean hard work! On many occasions employees would return home after 24 to 30 hours and more nonstop on the job, exhausted and dirty, but deep down inside a feeling of satisfaction of a job well done. “Memories abound of dropping down exhausted on the furnace floor or a substation floor or wherever at one-o-clock in the morning with a packet of Russians and chips to be devoured using dirty fingers before getting up again and back on the job. Of the tired frustration of trying, and trying again to get some stubborn piece of equipment working without success, these things always seemed to happen in the middle of the night! The noise, the heat, the dirt – and the danger – all contributed to cement some kind of powerful bond between the people on the job,” Mervyn shared his thoughts.

Years later, when a bunch of ex Highveld people get together one can still, over and over hear the phrase, “Do you remember when Jack fell into the clarifiers?” or “Do you remember that soul shattering breakout on the Slabmachine?” Somehow these, at the time difficult situations, turned everyone into one big efficient and confident team with very fond memories.

“Certainly there were people who didn’t fit in but I like to believe they left with the result that at the end of the day we had a stronger and closer knit team distributed throughout the works.”

One should never forget the ladies who worked at Highveld. They were just as much part of the team as any man. Working behind the scenes they attended to all the necessary red tape and drudgery that kept the wheels rolling.

“I remember incurring the wrath of the personnel manager when I told him, quite seriously, that the only people who worked in the personnel department were the women! The secretaries throughout the works were nearly all ultra-efficient in spite of sometimes being taken for granted. It’s so good to see at least one lady is still present from those long ago days and that’s Theresa Davies. She was Theresa Ibbetson then. We worked together in the Iron Plant around 1974 to 1975. I see she’s still doing a sterling job organising important functions.”

In the early days Highveld was considered as state of the art. If you were looking for excellent experience with modern equipment Highveld was the place to be. The training courses introduced by the company were first class
and up to date. Consultants were brought in to provide professional training in many important modern concepts like Reliability Centred Maintenance, Welding Technology, Briefing systems, various management programmes for all, Finance, Safety programmes, Leadership programmes like Situational Leadership amongst others. Even literacy training for those employees who could not read and write, were offered. Most of these programmes weren’t restricted to the more senior people but everybody attended on a roster basis. A number of employees who attended boiler inspection training as part of the Welding Institutes curriculum subsequently left and set themselves up in business as certificated boiler inspectors. All thanks to Highveld.

“We worked hard, we played hard. We were a wonderful team which was a great privilege to be part of. The Highveld Club provided a wonderful venue for letting off steam and developing further esprit de corps away from the job. The sporting facilities included squash and cricket and snooker and soccer and whatever else one might want to do. Any opportunity was seized for a party, whether it was for breaking the production record in one of the divisions or entertaining customers or apprentices coming out of their time. You name it, it was party time. But as I said, we worked hard and we played hard.”

Mervyn has a strong opinion about the Evraz takeover.

“Sadly, it was the beginning of the end and from then on Highveld went steadily downhill. Evraz sent people from overseas to manage a plant they knew nothing about. They also knew nothing about South African conditions or South African people. They thought they were going to show Highveld how to make steel but they themselves didn’t have a clue. The end result was the closure of Highveld and the loss of thousands of jobs with many employees receiving a pittance as severance pay. Businesses in the area closed own or went into business rescue. The shock reverberated throughout the region and Witbank took a bad knock. “This left many people devastated. I personally was broken hearted even though I was already retired and not affected financially. Highveld had been my life.”

And then almost a miracle happened. Johan Burger and his team decided that this was not going to be the end; in fact it was going to be a new beginning. Highveld was not going to be allowed to die and cut up for scrap, Highveld was going to rise again from the ashes as did the firebird Phoenix in ancient mythology. June 6 proved that this is the case. The official opening of the rehabilitated structural mill took place and blocks were rolled exactly as
they were in the Highveld Steel days. The completely reconditioned mill is up and running in a new complex called Highveld Industrial Park. This park is already off the ground with companies hiring plant and space for their own businesses. Training facilities, rail sidings, workshops and machine shops are all available for hire. There is a lot to come in the future including Highveld expanding their operation from the rolling mill to other areas.

Mervyn leaves us with a quote from William Shakespeare, “The bird of wonder dies. Her ashes create another heir. Who from the sacred ashes of her honour. Shall star-like rise as great in fame as she was.”