'When the crane lights are on it’s Christmastime'

As Christmas lights are switched on across the world at one site off the M1 in South Yorkshire it’s not a tree that’s being lit but a series of towering cranes.

Crane rental agency Wolffkran says the annual Christmas light switch-on near Sheffield has become a local tradition.

Managing director Richard Coughtree said the company had been lighting up its cranes, which overlook the motorway, since it moved to the site in 2002.

He said: “It’s grown momentum over the years. We get complaints if we don’t switch them on. When the lights are on it’s Christmastime, that’s the feeling.”

He added: “In the daylight they don’t look very appealing, but you put the Christmas lights on and it changes the dynamic completely.”

Crane operator Saul Blackburn helped decorate the cranes for the lighting ceremony on Thursday.

Saul Blackburn helped put Christmas lights on the cranes

He has worked for Wolffkran for more than 15 years and said he was a “very big Christmas person”.

“It’s brilliant when you’re driving down the motorway and you can see these cranes up in the air with all the lights on,” he said.

“I installed the lights on this crane a couple of weekends back and it’s a case of dragging all the lights up here – they’re all on big reels and drums – and grab one end of it and set off down the jib pulling it out.

“When you first start, because you’re only 18, you’re only a young lad, you don’t think about the height, it didn’t really bother me. But the older I get the more I think about it.”

Michelle Cook has worked with Wolffkran for 21 years

The lights have become a beloved Sheffield landmark, lighting up the journey home for Christmas or from a day’s shopping at Meadowhall.

Wolffkran employee Michelle Cook said: “I’ve worked here for 21 years so it means everything to us. It’s a nice give back to the community to put our Christmas lights on – lighting the journey home.

“If you say you work for Wolffkran people don’t know what you mean, but as soon as you say the cranes at the side of the M1 everyone knows where you work.

“It just means people know they’re close to home. It lights the way home for them.”

In the daylight the cranes look ordinary

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