Tuesday, June 10, is National Forklift Safety Day (NFSD) in both the UK and the US with this year’s campaign focusing on the human costs of accidents involving materials handling equipment.

The UK Material Handling Association (UKMHA) has the slogan “A Painted Line Isn’t Enough” for its campaign this year, while in the US, the focus of the Industrial Truck Association (ITA) will be on forklift safety, operator training, and daily equipment checks.

David Goss, UKMHA technical director, says while workplace accidents have a tendency to become just statistics, “for those involved, the consequences can last a lifetime”.

“By highlighting the human cost of such accidents – not just on the victims but also on equipment operators, co-workers, family and friends, we aim to highlight the human story that is the reality behind every statistic,” Goss adds.

The 2025 campaign will revisit the story of Lisa Ramos, whose life was irrevocably changed in 2006 when she became an above-knee amputee after an accident where a forklift truck reversed into her while she was in a designated walkway area in the warehouse where she worked with her husband, David.

In a video for the NSFD, both Lisa and David talk about the accident - which happened on their son’s 13th birthday - and the impact it has had on their lives. Lisa now campaigns for greater safety awareness in the workplace and urges businesses to take greater responsibility for the safety of their workforce.

A focus of this year’s campaign by the UKMHA is the importance of segregating pedestrians from materials handling equipment, the value of seatbelt use and the need to utilise appropriate PPE.

The UKMHA says it will also launch a major new safety initiative on June 10, “designed to improve safety across the entire material handling sector and to provide the industry with more accurate insights into incidents involving MHE”.

On the same day UKMHA will also release a new White Paper analysing the key takeaways from roundtable discussions among materials handling industry specialists about ways safety standards can be improved.

Tools and resources for this year’s National Forklift Safety Day can be found on UKMHA’s website.