Fork Lift Awareness

| |
St. Paul Fire & Marine Insurance Company

Summary Statement

A presentation on the dangers encountered using forklifts, and steps that could be taken to avoid them.

Forklift Accidents

  • OSHA estimates that there are 680,400 forklift accidents each year (1997)
  • Approximately 90,000 employees suffer some type of injury
  • losses affect employees

    • physical suffering
    • mental suffering
Benefits of forklifts
  • Assist in the movement of materials
  • Reduce employee lifting injuries
Forklift potential problems
  • Pedestrians
  • Blind spots
  • Indoors/Outdoors
  • Narrow aisles (and aisle intersections)
  • Building columns
  • Operate 24 hours per day
  • Turning radius
Forklift and Pedestrians
  • Pedestrians contribute to accidents
  • Pedestrians do not understand stopping distances
  • Pedestrians tried to “beat” a lift truck
Methods used to reduce Forklift Accidents
  • Training of drivers
  • Maintenance of equipment
  • Areas of operation
Forklift Accidents
  • Losses affect employers
    • damage to equipment
    • loss productivity
A breakdown of the 680,400 accidents:
  • 90,000 employees injured
  • 100 deaths
Source: Powered industrial truck accidents report through OSHA's "First report of serious accidents" 1985-1990


In percent what Causes Lift Truck Accidents?

Graph 1

Graph 2

Graph 3