Forklift improves OHS

Spotless Services Australia has selected a Toyota forklift to help improve the occupational health and safety of its team at the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG).

The MCG-based team members use the forklift to unload the weekly delivery of beer kegs from the back of trucks. Before purchasing Toyota's 427FG25, 2.5 tonne petrol/LPG forklift, the staff unloaded and moved the kegs by hand, a process both time consuming and potentially unsafe.

Seeing the team members handle the kegs in this manner LED Spotless' occupational health and safety coordinator, Erin Tempest, to investigate a safer option.

Ms Tempest said Toyota was the only company that could provide a forklift with the features her company needed and the training to support the new product.

"Spotless chose Toyota because it was the only company willing to work with us to develop a training program for the forklift," she said. "They provided safety training on site (at MCG) as part of the program."

TMH Vic provided risk assessments alongside those undertaken by Spotless and selected a custom-made 'keg-handler' attachment for the forklift, designed to lift up to nine full kegs at a time.

Ms Tempest said the keg-handler was easy to remove, allowing the forklift to be used for other tasks, and the handler to be sent to other sites for use at events including the Australian Grand Prix.