Forklifts and Bumper Cars: It’s a Game of Chance

Forklift collision prevention is what every safety manager wants to achieve. But is it as easy as that? Visiting warehouses, distribution centers and manufacturing facilities, we get to see it all…the good, the bad and the ugly. What can safety professionals do to lower the risk from a forklift collision prevention.

A Facility of Bumper Cars

A facility located in Illinois was searching for a solution for their facility. The facility was quite a busy one with 24 x 7 operations. The facility took care of commercial cartage when airplanes came into O’Hare airport. The company received the pallets of cargo, unpacked it, put some items away, picked other products and repacked the pallets. All of the pallets that just came in were to go out again on another flight. It’s quite an operation.

However, it was surely a dangerous one. As you walk into the facility, the only thing you notice are the forklifts flying past. No, it’s not an exaggeration, they were going at very fast speeds in various directions. No marked aisles to encourage driving in one direction or the other. The area by the docks was large, empty and well lit. It was surely a surprising scene. The warehouse manager said, “you need to stay in the pedestrian lanes, these guys are busy breaking down pallets and getting new ones built to be sent out the same day.” It was a disaster waiting to happen.

Lots of Near Misses

Since there were a couple of people visiting the facility that day, watching from the sidelines could prove interesting. A truck had just come in with some cargo. There were workers unwrapping each of the pallets and forklifts waiting seconds for them to finish. Once they did, the forklifts went into action. Each picked up smaller amounts from the broken-down pallets and were racing to put them away. Some of the workers were rearranging the remaining cargo as they were going right back out to a new destination.

As much as you’d like to believe it to be controlled chaos, it was simply chaos. There were multiple times when a forklift needed to swerve in a different direction due to an oncoming forklift. Or the forklifts were so close in passing, you naturally turned away thinking, “this time they will hit.”

That was just the trucks. Add on the racking systems, product staged on the floor, pallets and a brave few pedestrians who decided that it would be a good idea to walk outside of the pedestrian lanes. Good luck!

Forklifts vs Bumper Cars

The only difference between the two was that with bumper cars, you’re allowed to hit another bumper car with safety precautions put into place. If the two bumper cars hit, no bid deal. The car and the driver were safe. Lift trucks without a forklift collision prevention system was a messy business.

Forklift Collision Prevention

The first question asked was, “Is the forklift collision prevention system going to slow down production?” No. What it is going to do are three areas:

1. Question how the flow of traffic currently exists and encourage a better, more efficient way of directing traffic. In addition, this will also reveal who needs targeted training.
2. The forklift collision prevention system will identify a pedestrian that wandered away from the pedestrian walkway and an object. When another forklift, for instance, comes too close, it will notify the driver and they can immediately take action. If a pedestrian comes nearby, it too will identify the human, notify with the symbol of a person make a definitive sound and allow the driver the take action.
3. Telemetry dashboard is tracking all the information that the S3 safety system is capturing. You’ll know exactly what’s going on before you make the changes, after you make the changes and finally any tweaks or modifications to ensure improvements.

Getting Started

Let’s get started with a demonstration of the S3 Safety System. If it could work with forklifts and bumper cars, it can certainly help you. Contact us at sales@siera.ai. We’ll contact you right away.