When it comes to protecting pedestrians from forklift accidents, focus on processes—the ways you segment, train, manage and work on a daily basis. Preventable accidents happen when a process is absent. When it comes to forklifts and pedestrians, accidents are far too common and frequently serious.
A Step-by-Step Safety Process for Forklifts and Pedestrians
Tags: Safety & Ergonomics, facility safety, forklift fatality, Process Management, warning systems
Posted in Forklift - Pedestrian Safety|
AisleCop: Pedestrian or Forklift Priority?
Forklift safety systems are usually designed to restrain pedestrians, not forklifts
The reasoning for this choice is simple: it’s the same one that usually allows cars to have the right-of-way on public streets. It fits the operational needs of most warehouses and industrial facilities, but that’s not something that’s true in every case. Let’s go through your options for managing a pedestrian crossing in your facility using the AisleCop® system.
Posted in Forklift - Pedestrian Safety|
Three Inexpensive Ways to Reduce Forklift Accidents
You probably know the stats: Forklifts are extremely common, very productive and likely the most dangerous piece of machinery in any given warehouse. They seriously injure tens of thousands of people a year.
Over its lifespan, most every forklift will be involved in some type of accident. If that involves a pedestrian, the injuries can be ghastly and the costs astronomical. Here are some things we’ve recently looked at to help reduce the chances of such incidents.
Tags: forklift, forklift injury, warehouse accidents
Posted in Forklift - Pedestrian Safety|
How Can You Go Forklift-Free?
The forklift is ubiquitous in warehousing, manufacturing, distribution and other industrial operations, but many companies are actively working to reduce fleet size—or eliminate forklifts entirely.
Why eliminate forklifts?
This seems to be mostly about safety. Powered industrial trucks ranked sixth for OSHA violations in the most recent data. They’re always near the top. They cause about 100 deaths in the United States every year, and tens of thousands of injuries, with a high percentage termed “serious.” Forklifts are often the single most hazardous machine in any facility that operates them. Can you truly make a warehouse forklift free, as many EHS experts recommend? Maybe not, but you can minimize forklifts and keep them out of the most dangerous areas. Let’s dive into some methods.
Tags: Warehouse Management, Material Handling, Industrial Lifts, forklift
Posted in Forklift - Pedestrian Safety|
Strobe Lights vs. LED Warning Lights for Forklift Safety
It’s been a sudden transition: many forklifts no longer use flashing strobe or beacon lights and have transitioned to LED “blue light” forklift safety lights that project on the floor rather than flash on the forklift itself. Workers have never liked an excess of flashing lights, but to some extent this is because companies aren’t deploying the beacon lights for the right application. LED floor lights are true warning systems, while beacons are visibility enhancements for already visible trucks.
Why do warehouse workers prefer LED systems?
Posted in Forklift - Pedestrian Safety|
Why the Floor is Better than Eye Level for Forklift Safety Warnings
Forklifts dominate OSHA’s annual list of safety violations, so it’s no mystery why industrial companies are always searching for ways to improve safety.
Safety-conscious operations are integrating safety lights and sensors to help reduce pedestrian/forklift accidents. These systems usually detect traffic (people and forklifts), and then deploy visual and/or audible warnings to the driver, the pedestrian, or both. When it comes to visual warnings, some are ceiling-hung, others at eye level, and others are shot onto the floor. What placement works best, and why?
Posted in Forklift - Pedestrian Safety|
Cheap Forklift Warning Lights Could be Incredibly Expensive
You see them all over the place in warehouses these days – the ubiquitous blue forklift light gliding over the floor ahead of or behind a lift truck as it winds its way between rack rows, down aisles, across docks, and out of trailers. AÂ wide variety of choices are available, including many inexpensive imports with a bewildering number of dense specifications. How can you tell the difference?
Let’s break down the ways you can avoid the “bargain” light that could cost you plenty.
Tags: dock safety, warehouse accidents, lights, spotlights, forklift safety
Posted in Forklift - Pedestrian Safety|
Ways to Improve Forklift Driver Visibility and Awareness Factors
Driver awareness—or lack of it—is responsible for many forklift accidents
Busy, frazzled, distracted, or plain inattentive drivers whose sightlines are impaired may have accidents. They’ll collide with pallet rack posts, building columns, walls, machinery and a variety of other things. Worse, they sometimes hit people. What can you do to increase driver awareness and the ability to see what’s around them?
Posted in Forklift - Pedestrian Safety|
How to Protect Warehouse Pedestrians from Forklift Rear Swings
Forklifts aren’t cars, and they don’t drive like them.
They don’t brake or accelerate like cars, and they certainly don’t steer like them, yet accidents occur far too often because drivers and pedestrians don’t understand the difference. Pedestrians misunderstand the way forklifts maneuver, and the danger of walking or working around them. Forklifts aren’t dangerous to pedestrians only from the front or rear — they can also hit someone on foot from the side, frequently due to rear-end swings, since forklifts swing wide when they corner.
How can your reduce the chances for this type of accident?
Tags: forklift safety, warehouse accidents
Posted in Forklift - Pedestrian Safety|
Interview: Proximity Detection for Forklift – Pedestrian Safety
Safety has always been important to warehousing and manufacturing, but in recent years, the emphasis has grown – and it’s no wonder.
The forklift has always been at or near the top of these concerns, due to its common use. There are nearly 900,000 forklifts in use in the United State. Forklift accidents are always in OSHA’s top ten  safety violations lists. But the reality is that despite the dangers they can present, forklifts are indispensable for material handling operations.
We sat down with Randall Chamberlain, assistant manager of Cisco-Eagle’s Safety Automation Group, to discuss some common questions involving ZoneSafe, a proximity detection technology that helps alert drivers that pedestrians are nearby as they do their work.
Tags: forklift safety, sensors, dock safety, OSHA, training
Posted in Forklift - Pedestrian Safety|