How an inspection campaign actually runs
Non-destructive testing is only as good as the operation around it: the radiation safety regime, the chain of custody, the record created at the joint. This is how MPIA Services (PTY) Ltd runs a campaign, from the depot gate to the certified report — the same workflow on a two-day emergency call-out and a multi-month corridor programme.
1 · Mobilisation
Crews deploy from Umkomaas (eMkhomazi), KwaZulu-Natal to sites across all nine provinces. Equipment, sealed sources and safety documentation travel with the team — vehicles and kit are inspected and signed out against the job before departure, so what arrives on site is accounted for from the moment it leaves the depot.
2 · Radiation safety, before any exposure
Radiographic work runs under MPIA's SAHPRA licence. On site that means a daily safe-task instruction and toolbox talk before work starts; a demarcated exclusion zone around every exposure; radiation surveys before and after the work; sealed-source custody logged at every movement; and personal dosimetry for every team member, with doses recorded against occupational limits. Each control produces a record, completed digitally as the work happens.
3 · Capture at the joint
Every weld is captured digitally in the field — joint number, location, exposure details and imagery — on devices built to work without signal and synchronise when coverage returns. The record is created at the rail, on the day, by the technician who did the work: no paper transcription, no end-of-week reconstruction.
4 · Interpretation
Results are interpreted by SNT-TC-1A Level II and III personnel and classified against the applicable specification — C1, C2 or C3 in South African rail practice. Where the asset owner runs its own evaluation, as Transnet does, the workflow carries a parallel interpretation so both records exist side by side.
5 · Sign-off
Completed work is signed off in sequence — technician, supervisor, and client representative — with each signature captured digitally against the specific sets and joints it covers. Daily work records tie the day's output to the job, and films handed to the client are receipted on a delivery note.
6 · Certified reporting
Reports are generated from the captured data in the format the asset owner requires, reviewed, approved and dispatched digitally. Because every joint is captured against its job, any weld can be recalled later by reference — the report is backed by a retrievable record, not a filing cabinet.
Throughout · Equipment integrity
Inspection equipment is held on a calibration-tracked register: every instrument carries its calibration due date, and items are allocated to jobs with sign-out and sign-in custody. Daily equipment inspections cover the radiographic projectors, winding mechanisms and guide tubes before use.
Why the discipline matters
Every stage above leaves a record — survey readings, dose registers, custody logs, signed daily work records, classified results. When an auditor, a regulator or an incident investigation asks what happened at a weld two years ago, the answer exists and is retrievable. That is the practical meaning of working with a SAHPRA-licensed, SNT-TC-1A-certified contractor: the inspection is defensible long after the crew has left site. Read more about the regulatory side in what SAHPRA requires before a gamma source goes to site.
Planning a campaign?
Tell us the asset, the specification and the window. We will come back with crew, method and mobilisation timing.
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