How Common are Forklift Accidents?
Have you wondered how common are common forklift accidents? In taking to the Internet and conducting a simple search, it was evident that common forklift accidents stem many years back. I took a look at an article from 2003, over 20 years ago now and found that what was written all those years ago is still the same as today. But, does it need to be?
What are Common Forklift Accidents?
Common forklift accidents are issues that occur frequently while operating a forklift truck. One of the most common accidents from the article found on the 20 year old article was forklift tipping. Even though forklift training instructs you to put on a seat belt and ensure that the forklift operator does not jump off the forklift to avoid injury, instead fall with the forklift ensuring that the body remains in the cab of the forklift.
Another common forklift accident is striking a pedestrian or worker. One common way to hit a pedestrian is when the worker is behind the forklift and, even though the forklift driver looks before moving the forklift, workers do end up behind the truck, thinking the driver will look again, and instead get hit.
Why Does it Still Occur?
Even though technology has come a long way, no everyone has embraced it. There are a few reasons for forklift accidents to still occur:
“We never had one”. First, that is fantastic! You’ve taken many steps to ensure safety in the facility. But that doesn’t mean a common forklift accident won’t happen in your facility. That’s the point. Accidents are just that, an occurrence that you were not expecting to happen. If the accident does happen, what will that cost you in worker’s comp, missed time, temp workers, and other hard and soft costs?
- Management keeps pushing the investment to ‘next year’. Some like to push their luck a bit tell managers of safety that yes, we agree we need the safety technology, let’s do it next year. Then when next year comes, the same story is shared, frustrating the safety professionals.
Can it be Overcome?
Yes, both of these challenges can be overcome by understanding what you get. Sharing real examples is a good place to start. Showing the costs and how long those costs last with case studies. Another way that it can help is by purchasing a couple of forklift safety systems.
By implementing a couple of forklift safety systems in the facility will provide the ‘proof’ necessary because you’ll be capturing the information in real-time giving you the necessary insights. How?
Forklift Safety System
A forklift safety system by SIERA.AI scans with an AI camera searching for humans and objects separately. As it scans, every 60ms, the camera identifies a person or object within a defined distance. When it does, it immediately notifies the forklift driver with audio and visual alerts of a symbol of a person or box. Now the operator can take immediate action and get back to the task at hand.
All of the information is captured in real time and saved in our telemetry Dashboard. Here you can find critical data such as pass / fail forklift inspections, near miss detection, how many pedestrians were detected and how many objects were detected for any given period of time.
So if you are ready to make common forklift accidents a thing of the past, contact us to learn more about our forklift safety system today.
Contact Us!
Contact us today at sales@siera.ai or call us at (512) 817 0702.