Warehouse Safety Topics to Strengthen Safety Procedures

Discussing warehouse safety topics is a great way to increase awareness of hazards around the working environment. Furthermore, talking about practical solutions can mitigate and even eliminate these hazards, strengthening safety procedures and productivity. However, this is only possible if the right solutions are implemented. Let's take a look at what warehouse safety topics your team can revisit and explore any available solutions to improve safety procedures.

 

1. Fleet Management and Maintenance

A significant warehouse safety topic is fleet management and maintenance. Improper forklift fleet management can include missed maintenance, unauthorized driver operation, or pre-ops checklist incompletion. Any type of mismanagement like this can cause a forklift-related accident, potentially causing serious injuries or even death to drivers and/or pedestrians. A forklift fleet management tool can be a type of warehouse safety system that your team can implement to increase fleet visibility. ELOKON's smart forklift fleet management solution, ELOfleet, helps organize vehicle management schedules, permits authorized drivers only, and facilitates pre-ops checklists. These are just a few features that ELOfleet offers to material handling teams to streamline fleet management, even if a fleet has different makes and manufacturers. ELOfleet's web-based KPI dashboard also promotes team communication and strategy by highlighting what a fleet is doing well and where operations can improve.

 

2. Pedestrian Avoidance

While this may seem obvious, another important warehouse safety topic is pedestrian avoidance. While forklift drivers can be at risk for injury and death due to an accident, a forklift-related collision involving a pedestrian employee is often more serious for the pedestrian. Awareness and avoiding pedestrians (and other vehicles) around the warehouse are imperative. Although material handling teams can implement signage to highlight risks and designate routes, they don't actively prevent collisions. Employing automated safety systems like ELOKON ELOshield solutions can detect and prevent collisions before they occur. ELOshieldGO uses UWB technology to detect proximity between a forklift and a pedestrian employee, both of whom are equipped with the module. If the vehicle module detects a pedestrian in its warning and protection zones, different alarms can sound. The module could even automatically slow or stop the vehicle, preventing a collision. ELOshieldDRIVE works similarly, but it detects and prevents possible collisions between two forklifts.

 

3. Safety Zones

Discussing and designating safety zones are also warehouse safety topics that material handling teams should review. Recognizing that certain areas within the warehouse have more collision hazards is the first step in preventing them. The next step is to implement solutions that can make these warehouse areas a safer place to work. Zoning and speed control warehouse safety systems can actively prevent forklift-related accidents in such areas. ELOshieldZONE is ELOKON's fixed-position monitoring solution to prevent MHE collisions in high-traffic areas like entranceways, gates, and aisle entrances. ELOshieldZONE uses the same UWB tech that ELOshieldGO and ELOshieldDRIVE do, and it can slow the speed of vehicles passing each other in the designated zone. ELOshieldSPEED is our other safety zone solution that utilizes the same UWB tech, and it automatically reduces the speed of any vehicle entering the designated area. This is particularly helpful for areas where forklifts and autonomous vehicles work around each other.

 

4. VNA Safety

VNA are critical areas of most warehouses, and material handling teams should include their safety procedures when talking about warehouse safety topics. While VNAs offer optimized storage and organization capabilities, they decrease visibility, leaving teams vulnerable to forklift-related accidents. We've designed our ELOprotect and ELOprotect ACS solutions to prevent forklift-related collisions through smart laser technology that scans and detects obstacles around the equipped vehicle. These obstacles include pedestrian employees, other vehicles, or objects in line with the vehicle. Upon detecting an obstacle, ELOprotect or ELOprotect ACS will reduce the speed until it stops to prevent collision. Once the driver acknowledges that there is no more risk, the driver can continue operating the vehicle. Employing additional safety systems like ELOprotect ACS shows that your company is dedicated to ensuring the safety of your employees.

 

5. MHE Vehicle Speed Control

Speed control isn't only relevant in certain high-risk areas of the warehouse; indoor/outdoor transition areas pose a significant collision risk for speed-related accidents. Forklifts can be driven at top speeds in outdoor working areas, and the difference in brightness when returning to the warehouse can lead to accidents. Although drivers should practice caution when entering/leaving the warehouse and adjust their speed accordingly, human error can still result in a collision. Employing a solution like ELOKON's ELOspeed can reduce accidents in indoor/outdoor transition areas by automatically reducing the speed of the vehicle upon detecting the presence of the warehouse roof. ELOspeed uses radar to detect overhead superstructures, with the ability to distinguish overhead objects, such as roofs and trees.