Toyota Material Handling Marks 10th Annual Forklift Safety Day with New Slate of Safety Features
Toyota Material Handling is celebrating the 10th annual National Forklift Safety Day by reinforcing the importance of operator safety training, technology, and forklift safety practices as more new operators join the workforce every year.
National Forklift Safety Day, sponsored by the Industrial Truck Association, is an annual event that serves as the focal point for forklift manufacturers to educate customers, policymakers, and government officials about the safe use of forklifts and the importance of proper operator training.
“At Toyota, we are dedicated to helping the material handling industry foster a culture of safety,” said Tom Lego, Toyota Material Handling’s brand ambassador. "Toyota understands that any enduring culture of safety has its foundation in knowledge and best practice sharing – or yokoten – by promoting respect for careful habits when commuting around a facility.”
With involvement in National Forklift Safety Day since the inaugural event in 2014, Toyota Material Handling continues to innovate with product features to help support operators. Toyota’s latest technology, Smart Environment Sensor Plus (SEnS+), can assist operators in identifying a pedestrian or object behind their forklift. In addition to the system notifications, SEnS+ has industry-first features, including dynamic zoning, adjustable truck slowdown, and backward movement prevention.
The SEnS+ zoning feature automatically adjusts the detection range of obstacles in a 130-degree field of view up to 32 feet away, and limits forklift movements by engaging in regenerative braking to slow the truck speed for pedestrians and objects in specific conditions.
System of Active Stability
Most Toyota Forklifts come standard with the System of Active Stability (SAS), which instantaneously detects operational hazards prone to instability. SAS generates more than 3,000 readings per second and can automatically stabilize the rear axle to help operators maintain lateral stability, reducing the overall risk of potential accidents.
Both SEnS+ and SAS are part of Toyota Assist, a robust family of advanced features and options that work together to passively or actively assist forklift operability, productivity or situational awareness.
“The operator is the most important component of a forklift,” Lego said. “Training and investing in these individuals is paramount, even for the most seasoned operators. There is always something new in this industry because each setting is unique and different. We build great trucks for many different applications using the best technology, but we find that proper training and ample opportunities to hone the skills of these essential workers are the most important investments in forklift safety.”
Toyota works with customers to help instill a culture of safety in conjunction with Toyota Assist operator enhancements, free site surveys, consultations and operator training. All 230 dealers in Toyota’s nationwide dealer network offer training upon request.
For more resources, visit Toyota Material Handling’s National Forklift Safety Day page at ToyotaForklift.com.
About the Author
Michael Roth
Editor
Michael Roth has covered the equipment rental industry full time for RER since 1989 and has served as the magazine’s editor in chief since 1994. He has nearly 30 years experience as a professional journalist. Roth has visited hundreds of rental centers and industry manufacturers, written hundreds of feature stories for RER and thousands of news stories for the magazine and its electronic newsletter RER Reports. Roth has interviewed leading executives for most of the industry’s largest rental companies and manufacturers as well as hundreds of smaller independent companies. He has visited with and reported on rental companies and manufacturers in Europe, Central America and Asia as well as Mexico, Canada and the United States. Roth was co-founder of RER Reports, the industry’s first weekly newsletter, which began as a fax newsletter in 1996, and later became an online newsletter. Roth has spoken at conventions sponsored by the American Rental Association, Associated Equipment Distributors, California Rental Association and other industry events and has spoken before industry groups in several countries. He lives and works in Los Angeles when he’s not traveling to cover industry events.