What are Forklift Impact Levels and Where Does that Data Go?

A Forklift impact can be categorized in three different ways: low, medium and high. The purpose for the different categories is to be able to understand the severity of the forklift impact to determine the implications of potential losses and the costs that are incurred as a result. That’s not to say that every forklift impact has a loss or a cost associated with it, but that’s where the telemetry Dashboard will come in handy.

A Forklift Impact

A forklift impact is a concern for safety managers. It’s an opportunity for an injury to occur, a pedestrian could be involved or a product / facility can become damaged. However, for the majority of the times when there is a forklift impact, the safety manager only finds out when it’s a high impact or sometimes a medium impact. Usually when it’s obvious and some sort of damage is done. Otherwise, the forklift impact will go unreported.

Being able to categorize the forklift impact will enable you to analyze the findings and take steps to minimize the medium and high impacts while determining how low impacts can be managed and/or avoided.

Real-Time Forklift Impact Detection

You can purchase only an impact detection piece of equipment, but why incur the added expense? Some forklift safety systems such as the S2 Digital Checklist with Impact Detection comes automatically with it. However, be sure you get a system in its entirety, meaning it also includes the telemetry Dashboard, which is also included in the S2.

A real-time forklift impact means that as soon as a low, medium or high impact occurs, the real-time system records it in the Dashboard. If you want to know about only the high impacts or only the medium to high impacts, the telemetry Dashboard will notify you. You set it yourself in the Dashboard by simply toggling the switch.

Low Forklift Impact

A low forklift impact are the ones that go unreported. However, low forklift impacts can be identifiers for what can be a ‘high risk’ area for forklift accidents. This information will be calculated for you in the telemetry Dashboard.

A low forklift impact can include slamming on the brakes. You may think, ‘eh’ not a big deal. Let’s give you a couple scenarios. A forklift driver places a large amount of pressure on the brakes when he turned the corner to tight. But why? Was there something there? Were there boxes blocking the way? Was the driver speeding? Was the driver aware of the surroundings?

Let’s consider another example. A forklift driver slams on the brakes in what you believe was a clear, open aisle. Did a worker come out from under the racking system into the aisle? Did a pallet shift on the rack and startled the driver? Was the driver on his cell phone and didn’t notice the pedestrian or that the driver was too close to the racking systems edge? Low level impacts can provide a world of insights that can eventually build up to become a full-blown accident costing your company in many ways.

Medium Forklift Impact

A medium impact means that something was struck but minimal damage was incurred. Medium forklift impacts can mean that this area of the facility is a target for an accident. There may have been many unreported incidents in that area, and now it’s mature enough where small impacts are beginning to take place.

When a forklift safety system is installed, and medium impacts are quickly being identified, further analysis in the telemetry Dashboard will help you to determine critical information so you can decide what action is needed to get this issue under control. This will curb the issue from growing into a high impact.

High Forklift Impact

A high forklift impact is everything you want to avoid. A large enough G-Force between two pieces of equipment, a pedestrian or part of the facility. When a G-Force is recorded as above the threshold you set, this will be categorized as high. The damage is done and now you need to ensure safety in that area so history doesn’t repeat itself.

Telemetry Dashboard

The telemetry Dashboard is the critical data captured and categorized as low, medium and high, based on the flexible settings you choose. We call it flexible as you can set the categories to whatever you determine to be reflective of your operation. The system adjusts to what you want, not the other way around. This provides you a more accurate account based on your facility. If you need to make adjustments, that can be done at any time.

What’s Next

This is critical data that you need today. This is the best way to avoid being a news headline. Give it a try by contacting SIERA.AI at sales@siera.ai. We’ll ask you a few questions and get you set up.