4 Safety Concerns that Can Cause Injuries in Your Facility

Safety should be a focus of your facility every day. There are many ways for you and your employees to get injured in your workplace. This causes some concerns to arise. Below, we will list four possible ways and solutions to prevent these injuries from happening. We will start with falling items, then move onto forklift and other moving equipment related injuries, and then wrap up with visitors wandering around your unfamiliar facility.

Walking the shop floor becomes a routine over time. Because of this, workers may zone out while walking, not paying attention to their surroundings. Pallet rack is a common product for workers to pass. These tall shelves with product and inventory stored on them may be an accident waiting to happen. If a forklift or another worker is on the other side of those racks and pushes an item too far back, the item can fall off the shelf and onto the unsuspecting worker below. If you would like to see the OSHA requirements for fall protection and falling object hazards, click here.

WireCrafters offers a solution: Our RackBack Pallet Rack Backing Panels. Mounted to your existing pallet rack, the RackBack panels sturdy design does not flex when items are pushed too far back on the pallet. This guarantees your workers will be safe walking through your facility.

Forklifts Around Your Facility

Another avenue for injury involves the forklifts driving around your facility all day. Your workers should be aware of the forklifts and other moving equipment, but accidents can still happen. According to OSHA, nearly 100,000 injuries occur each year involving forklifts. The amazing part is, seventy percent of these injuries are preventable with the proper training and protocols in place.

Adding a simple GuardRail in your facility can prevent inattentive workers from being injured. WireCrafters GuardRail has been tested to withstand a ten-thousand-pound load traveling over 4 miles per hour. Watch Milt discuss it below.

Safety Around Moving Machinery

While we are talking about moving equipment, your employees may also work around moving machinery and robots each day. In 2018, Machinery and Machine Guarding requirements was the ninth most cited OSHA offense. If you are unsure if your machine needs guarding just think: if it has moving parts, it needs guarding. For more information on OSHA Machine Guarding Standards, click here. Learn more about WireCrafters Machine Guarding Solutions.

As I mentioned in the first paragraph, sometimes your facility will have visitors who are unfamiliar with the inner workings of your organization. If there are multiple access points into the building, one of those doors will potentially be left open, allowing anyone from the outside to walk in. Without prior knowledge to how your facility works, they can wander into an area with moving machines, or into the path of an oncoming forklift. Protect these people, and your workers from this easily avoidable situation.

WireCrafters offers Driver and Building Access Cages to deal with this exact situation. Visitors cannot gain access in to the buildings and drivers can still interact with you through a service window that can be installed. The cage is also equipped with a push bar door only accessible from the facility side. This is in case your employees need to exit the facility quickly.

Conclusion

Your workers’ safety needs to be your number one priority. I have a goal for you. Sometime today or this week, walk around your facility floor and make sure that each one of these potential areas of injury are taken care of. If not, check more of our machine guard materials that will help protect your employees.