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I feel safer already!

http://lee.org/blog/archives/2008/01/02/…

I’m now a certified forklift operator, whatever that means. Flaming Lotus Girls organized a certification class with this OSHA certified guy. This was partially in response to Todd Blair, a member of SRL, being severely injured after the conclusion of Robodock; though a forklift wasn’t to blame for his injury, I think it got us all thinking about safety in general.

And it’s not as if this certification will actually help keep anyone safe.

In order to pass, you had to score a 60% on a True/False quiz and drive the forklift around the yard without killing anyone… The next time you see a certified forklift driver, know that they might have scored a 61%.

The 30 minute video told us not to let people ride around on the forks, not to lift things that exceed the rated capacity of the forklift, not to lift things that are too big, not to drive around like a crazy person with the forks at head-height, to honk the horn before you go backwards, not to service the forklift unless you are “authorized”, and to never check a fuel tank with a lighter…

This entry was posted on Thursday, January 3rd, 2008 at 11:00 am and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

5 Responses to “I feel safer already!”

  1. mattymatt Says:
    January 3rd, 2008 at 2:09 pm

    I highly recommend you purchase a Massachusetts elevator operator’s license. It’s an immensely amusing test, including true/false questions about the safety of stepping out into an empty elevator shaft. The only unfunny part of the procedure is that it costs $20. (This was when I was in college in Boston; and insanely, I wasn’t allowed to help my friends move into the dorms unless I bought a license for myself.)

  2. Randomizer Says:
    January 3rd, 2008 at 2:48 pm

    so its okay if I keep using a match?

  3. brian Says:
    January 3rd, 2008 at 4:50 pm

    so its okay if I keep using a match?

    Sure! Just make sure it’s your own forklift and you are far, far away when you do it.

  4. Aaron Says:
    January 4th, 2008 at 12:11 am

    I’ve been reading your blog for a while now. Awesome stuff!

    This is exactly what my partner told me one day when we were coming back from a call.
    He said “Do you know what they call a someone who scored a 65% on the final? A paramedic.”

    Makes you feel better about calling 911, eh?

    (Of course he followed that up by saying “…and for everyone that scored under 65%, they call them ‘officer’.”)

  5. Noah D Says:
    January 4th, 2008 at 1:54 am

    You’d be surprised at what kind of bad craziness people get into with forks.

    Okay, well, maybe not.

    My story: I used to work at Ryder warehousing (contracted with AC Delco to store and ship new and used auto and marine batteries around the midwest). For reasons still unknown, one of the warehouse guys drove the forklift at full speed into one of the empty trailers on our dock. This one hand the extra-long tines, and they punched right through the trailer wall and into the tractor cab, right at about head-height for the driver – who was not in the cab at the time.

    It’s believed that alcohol was a factor.

    That one was kind of anomalous – most of our monthly dosage of stupid was administered by the truck drivers, not the warehouse staff.