Podcast: Don't depend on technology to keep your warehouse safe
Key Highlights
- OSHA urges proactive forklift safety, promoting cameras, collision avoidance, and telematics to prevent incidents before they occur.
- Proper forklift training can cut operational errors and accidents by up to 70%, making continuous education critical.
- Safety technology helps, but operators must stay vigilant—responsibility for safe forklift operation remains with the driver.
- As fleets adopt lithium-ion batteries, third-party certifications like UL, SGS, and TÜV are key for validating safety and compliance.
In this special National Forklift Safety Day podcast, hear what OSHA's David Keeling and Logisnext Americas' Carl Modesette have to say about the need for situational awareness from everybody who comes near a forklift, not just the operators. And ENEROC USA's Max Khabur explains why standardized forklift battery testing is essential for safety.
Below is an excerpt from the podcast:
Welcome to the latest episode of Supply Chain Insider, part of the Great Question podcast series produced by Endeavor Business Media’s Manufacturing Group, a division of EndeavorB2B. Here’s where you’ll get news, information, and compelling conversations on the latest developments in supply chain management. I’m Dave Blanchard, editor-in-chief of Material Handling & Logistics, which you can find at mhlnews.com. Welcome to the podcast.
For the past 13 years, the second Tuesday in June has been recognized in the material handling and industrial safety worlds as National Forklift Safety Day. In fact, the very first NFSD was launched with Material Handling & Logistics as the founding media partner, when my then-colleague Tom Andel worked with the Industrial Truck Association to publicize and promote the event. Both Tom and I had the opportunity to travel to Washington, DC, to participate in the Forklift Safety Days events, which have featured thought leaders from the major forklift OEMs, OSHA directors, and occasionally members of Congress knowledgeable about workplace safety.
This year, David Keeling, recently installed as the director of OSHA, made his debut at Forklift Safety Day. Keeling’s background includes stints at two major material handling and logistics-focused companies, namely UPS, where he began his career, rising through the ranks to become vice president of global health and safety, and then at retail giant Amazon, where he served as director of global transportation safety. So it’s safe to say (no pun intended) that director Keeling knows his way around warehouses and loading docks and is no stranger to the need for forklift safety.
Keeling opened by observing that OSHA has historically been known primarily as an enforcement agency, but that they’d also like to be in the solutions business and in the abatement business as well. “We want to collaborate and engage with industry,” he stressed. When it comes to workplace safety, whether it’s in the warehouse, in a manufacturing plant, in the yard or on the road, it’s better for companies to be preventive and proactive rather than reactive. One of the ways OSHA plans to help companies is to encourage the adoption of safety technologies – such as pedestrian detection cameras and sensors, collision avoidance systems, and telematics. These technologies, Keeling said, can be a game changer when it comes to enhancing forklift safety.
Carl Modesette, director of the Americas Design Center at forklift manufacturer Logisnext Americas, next offered a look at the size and reach of the forklift industry. According to a study conducted by Oxford Economics, more than 4.5 million forklift operators are employed in the US alone, and when you factor in pedestrians and other people who come within range of a forklift, potentially tens of millions of people come in close contact with forklifts every day.
The good news, Modesette pointed out, citing OSHA research, is that proper forklift operating training can reduce operational errors by up to 70%. And OSHA believes that accidents can be reduced by about the same percentage. For that to happen, though, safety has to be a continuous, iterative process. Modesette noted that safety is holistic, dependent on the interrelationship between several key functions: OEM manufacturers, employers, employees, statutes and standards, service and maintenance providers, and above all, he emphasized, YOU. He cited an ANSI/ITSDF standard that says, unambiguously, “Safe operation [of a forklift] is the responsibility of the operator.”
Nevertheless, robust and comprehensive training is necessary, he said, to ensure the operator is fully aware of and skilled in operating the vehicle.
Adopting appropriate technologies is part of the equation to achieving sustainable forklift safety, Modesette said, but there are some pitfalls to avoid when attempting to use these technologies.
Number 1, he said, is to avoid rushing into technology adoption. Make sure you understand how the tech works, make sure the operators understand how it works, and be aware of any concurrent risks that adopting the tech might introduce.
Number 2, don’t transfer responsibility to the technology. Pedestrians need to always be aware of the presence of a forklift. And operators need to maintain operational awareness and not get complacent that the technology will reduce the need for the operator to be vigilant and aware.
Number 3, make sure you consult with the OEM when adopting the new technology. It’s always important that the tech is properly installed.
Shifting gears slightly, I’d like to include some insights from Max Khabur, a director with ENEROC USA, a manufacturer of lithium batteries for forklifts. Max wrote an article for MH&L specifically for National Forklift Safety Day, entitled "Forklift Battery Certification Standards: What Matters Most for Safety?" The article appeared on June 9, which of course was NFSD 2026, and I’d like to cite a few excerpts from his article.
BEGIN ARTICLE EXCERPTS
Every June, National Forklift Safety Day serves as a reminder that material handling equipment is simultaneously one of the most productive and most hazardous categories of industrial machinery. Forklifts are involved in roughly 85 fatal accidents and nearly 35,000 serious injuries in the United States every year (even though batteries are very rarely the cause). As the industry accelerates its transition to electric from propane and diesel-powered machines (often bypassing lead-acid batteries) to lithium-ion power, battery certification safety standards are becoming increasingly important.
The question facing fleet managers, procurement officers and operations directors is not simply “Is my battery safe?” but “How do I know it is safe, and who validated that claim?”
The answer sits at the intersection of three globally recognized testing and certification bodies: UL (Underwriters Laboratories), SGS and Toof (TÜV). Each carries genuine technical authority. Each tests to rigorous standards. And each carries a different weight depending on where in the world you are doing business.
Lithium-ion batteries for industrial forklifts represent a significant departure from the lead-acid chemistry that powered material handling for over a century. The energy density is higher, the charge cycles are longer, and the performance is superior. So is the potential risk if a battery is not engineered and validated correctly.
Thermal runaway—the chain reaction that can cause a lithium cell to overheat, vent and in worst cases, ignite—is the safety scenario that keeps engineers and risk managers awake. No certification eliminates that risk entirely. But rigorous third-party testing to recognized standards is how the industry separates batteries that have been proven safe under controlled abuse conditions from those that have not.
For industrial applications, the applicable UL standards are specific.
The testing process itself, whichever body conducts it, also requires an ongoing relationship: factory audits, annual reviews, and change management protocols whenever cells, BMS components, or structural elements are modified. Certification is not a one-time stamp. It is a living compliance relationship.
All three bodies are recognized as Nationally Recognized Testing Laboratories (NRTLs) by OSHA, the U.S. agency with authority over workplace safety. That is the baseline regulatory requirement for electrical products used in American workplaces. Here is the practical reality: These are all legitimate, globally respected certification bodies. The testing they perform to UL standards is functionally equivalent. The difference is not safety; it is a commercial signal.
North America’s testing, inspection and certification (TIC) market is projected to grow from $239 billion in 2025 to nearly $283 billion by 2030, driven in part by the electrification of industrial vehicles and tighter regulatory enforcement. Within that growth, one of the clearest regional dynamics is the divergence between U.S. market expectations and the rest of the world.
In North America, and particularly in the U.S. industrial battery space, UL certification increasingly functions as the default market expectation. OEM qualification processes, insurance assessors like FM Global, and local fire marshals with AHJ authority all tend to orient toward UL. An absence of the UL mark does not automatically close a door, but it adds friction: more explanation is required, more flexibility needed from the buyer.
Outside North America, the picture shifts. SGS and TÜV carry equivalent or superior commercial weight in European, Asian and emerging market contexts. For a manufacturer supplying customers across multiple continents, a single-body strategy (e.g., pursuing only UL) may leave significant gaps in international market access.
Whether you choose UL, TÜV, or SGS, the battery must survive a “torture test” to ensure it won’t become a liability in your warehouse. These tests are standardized across all labs:
- Thermal Abuse. The battery is subjected to extreme temperature swings (e.g., -20°C to 70°C) to ensure it remains stable.
- Mechanical Torture. This includes crush tests (applying tons of pressure), impact tests (dropping weights), and a roll-over test to simulate a forklift collision.
- Electrical Safeguards. Testing the battery management system (BMS) to ensure it shuts down safely during overcharging or a short circuit.
- Fire Propagation. Ensuring that if one cell fails, the entire battery pack doesn’t turn into an uncontainable thermal runaway event.
The takeaway is straightforward: When it comes to technical rigor and the test items themselves, there is no essential difference between the three. What changes is the mark on the certificate, and the commercial weight that mark carries in a given market.
The spirit of National Forklift Safety Day is not paperwork compliance. It is the genuine protection of the people who operate, maintain and work around powered industrial equipment every day.
Certification from UL, SGS, or TÜV is not a guarantee against every possible failure. It is evidence that an independent, technically qualified body subjected a battery to rigorous, standardized abuse testing, and that the battery performed within safe parameters. It is the manufacturer’s commitment, validated externally, that the product has been built and tested to protect the people who rely on it.
UL remains the gold standard for North American market access and commercial credibility. SGS offers a proven, globally scalable NRTL pathway with strong international acceptance. TÜV brings European engineering rigor and broad recognition across international markets. None of these is the wrong answer. The wrong answer is a battery with no credible third-party certification at all.
Safety starts with the standard. Make sure yours is built on one.
END OF ARTICLE EXCERPTS
On the mhlnews.com website, if you go to the article "Forklift Battery Certification Standards: What Matters Most for Safety?," you’ll find a helpful chart from Max Khabur that compares UL, SGS, and TÜV: side by side. And you can check out our extensive collection of other forklift safety articles at the website as well.
And that’s going to wrap it up for this National Forklift Safety Day installment of Supply Chain Insider. As mentioned, we’ve been covering forklift safety for a long, long time, so please feel free to visit Material Handling & Logistics – at mhlnews.com – for more insights into the technologies and strategies companies are using to keep their warehouses safe and prevent forklift accidents. If you liked this podcast, we encourage you to subscribe to The Great Question wherever you get your podcasts. So for MH&L, I’m Dave Blanchard. Stay safe and stay healthy. And take care.
About the Podcast
Great Question: A Manufacturing Podcast offers news and information for the people who make, store and move things and those who manage and maintain the facilities where that work gets done. Manufacturers from chemical producers to automakers to machine shops can listen for critical insights into the technologies, economic conditions and best practices that can influence how to best run facilities to reach operational excellence.
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About the Author
Adrienne Selko
Adrienne Selko is senior editor at EHS Today and Material Handling & Logistics. Previously, she was in corporate communications at a medical manufacturing company as well as a large regional bank. Adrienne received a bachelor’s of business administration from the University of Michigan.