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Loading
Dock Safety
Forklift
accidents happen in many areas of a warehouse, yard
operation, or manufacturing facility. But the area that
tends to see the most accidents is the loading dock
area.
Think about that for a minute. Some facilities have
over 50 loading bays; most have a tractor-trailer backed
into them waiting to be loaded or unloaded. A single
forklift can travel over that dock plate 100 times or
more in just one shift. Multiply that by 3 shifts and
52 weeks in a year, plus the ongoing pressures of meeting
quotas, and the chance of an accident occurring is extremely
high.
| Accidents in Loading Dock Area |
- One of the most common accidents is a trailer
rolling away from the dock because the wheels
of the trailer were not chocked, or the trailer's
ICC bar was not locked to the dock. Many times
this results in the forklift falling between
the dock and the trailer.
- Landing gear collapse is another accident.
- Tractor-trailers pulling away too soon, because
the driver thought that the trailer was already
loaded or unloaded.
- A forklift falls through the floor of the
trailer because the floor was rotted.
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Safety
Tips To Remember
The following are some helpful safety tips to keep
in mind before you even start to enter a trailer/railroad
car with a forklift/powered pallet truck.
- Make sure that the brakes on the tractor are set
and the wheels are chocked. Make sure that you use
chocks that will grip better in snow or ice. If you
have a dock lock, ensure that the trailer's ICC bar
is locked. Wheel stops should also be used on railroad
cars and rail car brakes are set.
- Ensure that the dock plates are fully lowered or
extended onto the trailer/railroad car.
- If the tractor is disconnected from the trailer
while loading or unloading, make sure a trailer support
is put under the front of the trailer to prevent tipping.
A fully loaded forklift in the front of an empty trailer
could cause a counterbalancing effect and cause the
trailer to tip forward.
- Practice good communication with the driver of the
tractor-trailer. Let him/her know your company policies
about loading or unloading a trailer. This will help
to prevent early departure from the dock. Even though
the wheels are chocked, a trailer driver can drive
right over a wheel chock.
ICC bars are missing from the backs of trailers because
the driver pulled away while locked to the dock. So,
some companies have instituted a key surrender program,
where the driver must hand over the keys to their
tractor, and then they are returned after the truck
has been cleared for departure.
- Inspect the floors of the trailers. Before entering
the trailer, look to see if there are holes in the
floor and whether the trailer floor will support the
combined weight of the forklift and the load.
- Have good lighting provided when in the trailer
by using the headlights on the forklifts and using
docklights.
Safety
Myths
When conducting forklift operator training classes
at Thompson and Johnson, we encounter some myths that
should be addressed.
Who is responsible for
chocking the wheels of the trailer?
Keep in mind that safety is your responsibility,
the forklift/power pallet truck operator, not the driver
of the tractor-trailer. Signs in the loading dock area
that read "Driver Must Chock Wheels of the Trailer"
are helpful, but they are no guarantee that this task
will get done. A driver can get distracted or just forget,
and the tractor-trailer can roll away from the dock.
The forklift operator should always look to see that
the wheels are chocked/locked before boarding the trailer.
Isn't the tractor-trailer
driver supposed to bring his own chocks?
No. Again, this makes you, the forklift operator, dependent
on someone else to see that this task gets performed.
If you have your own chocks at your facility, then you
can be assured that the chocks are available to be placed
under the wheels of the trailers.
We have inclined docks
at our facility. Do we really need wheel chocks?
The answer to this is in the above "Did You Know"
section where the OSHA rules clearly state that that
the wheels of all highway trucks are chocked. There
are no exceptions stated in that rule for facilities
with slanted docks.
We only use powered pallet
trucks. Do we still need to chock the wheels of the
trailer? Again, the OSHA rule reads that
chocks are placed under the wheels of highway trucks
while being boarded with a powered industrial truck.
A powered pallet truck is considered a powered industrial
truck.
Rules are in place to keep you safe. Accidents occur
when these rules are broken. Never be in a hurry. Always
take a few seconds to ENSURE YOUR OWN SAFETY. Depend
on no one else to do it for you!
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