When I worked for Blake’s and was reversing onto one of their bays, the warehouse guys would often open the shutter to see what goodies I had bought them. There were signs telling them not to, but no one really seemed to worry.
One evening I was backing up with the barn doors open and caught a movement out of the corner of my eye in the passenger side mirror. I stomped on the brake and when I looked there was a head poking out. I jumped out, ran round and politely asked him to move…
I was quite shaken up to think that I had come within a second or two of crushing some guy’s head so I went in and reported it to management. To their credit, they did stop opening the doors after that.
On the day he died, he was at the rear of a vehicle and appeared to be trying to get the driver’s attention in the wing mirror.
The court was told he looked round and his head and torso became trapped between the lorry and the loading bay.
Judge Sheridan said Mr Sontowski’s death was as a result of a wheel-locking mechanism failing on equipment used to load and unload goods from lorries.
But according to sadly too many on here health and safety and things like wheel locking mechanisms on bays are all a load of ■■■■■■■■.
What happens to these large fines ? where do they actually go ■■
Are they used to support the victims ? widows ? or gobbled up by Govt as general revenue ■■?
Don’t see how a wheel locking mechanism would have saved the life of someone who ends up behind a reversing lorry, but happy to be educated.
An absolute tragedy, bloke doing an honest days work doesn’t get to go home to his family after work, dreadful.
Its this very scenario why i always reverse leaning out of the door with the window closed, not only the extra not reduced (by mirror convex) vision, but any unexpected sounds will be better captured/reflected should the unthinkable happen.
the best system i have seen is at triumph Hinckley. bloke stand’s on loading bay door open you reverse nice and steady when you are where he want’s you he gives a big blast on his whistle. simples…
Conor:
On the day he died, he was at the rear of a vehicle and appeared to be trying to get the driver’s attention in the wing mirror.
The court was told he looked round and his head and torso became trapped between the lorry and the loading bay.
Judge Sheridan said Mr Sontowski’s death was as a result of a wheel-locking mechanism failing on equipment used to load and unload goods from lorries.
But according to sadly too many on here health and safety and things like wheel locking mechanisms on bays are all a load of ■■■■■■■■.
I don’t think people think that things like that are ■■■■■■■■. I think it’s the fact you can pull up to these places, have a wheel locking mechanism in place, have to put a Suzie lock on your red line, hand your keys in but then still have to sit in a ■■■■ waiting room listening to people talk ■■■■■■■■, instead of your comfy cab.
Juddian:
Don’t see how a wheel locking mechanism would have saved the life of someone who ends up behind a reversing lorry, but happy to be educated.
If I had to hazard a guess, if the system was working properly they wouldn’t have been able to open the dock door until there was a wagon there with it’s wheels locked in place.
Will_161:
I don’t think people think that things like that are ■■■■■■■■. I think it’s the fact you can pull up to these places, have a wheel locking mechanism in place, have to put a Suzie lock on your red line, hand your keys in but then still have to sit in a [zb] waiting room listening to people talk ■■■■■■■■, instead of your comfy cab.
The logic behind waiting rooms is more to do with having waiting drivers in a “safe place” and not wandering around a “high risk” yard to & from the toilet/brew machine, out polishing cabs, walking over for a chat with their mate etc.
It’s not totally unreasonable given these fines that get chucked about, my complaint is more with the standard of these waiting rooms and how long your expected to sit in them.
rob22888:
Juddian:
Don’t see how a wheel locking mechanism would have saved the life of someone who ends up behind a reversing lorry, but happy to be educated.If I had to hazard a guess, if the system was working properly they wouldn’t have been able to open the dock door until there was a wagon there with it’s wheels locked in place.
I thought most places with the green/red light system worked like that too, door won’t open unless the green light is on.
Or the position of the door can set the lights to red or green. Ie door open puts red light on. Door down puts green light on.
I found sainsburys to have one of the best systems…go to office…they dedicate a bay…reverse on… lock the cab…hang your keys on a chain by the bay…they pull them up…red light goes on…that stays red until tipped, then goes green or they call your company name when your in the waiting room…keys dropped back down…everyone is safe…except drivers who have to listen to the piffle…unless outside having a smoke or coffee.
We have the salvo system, the bay door won’t open until the look is placed on the trailer and the the key locked into the box, the key will not be released from the box until the bay door is closed.
Simple and effective.
truckyboy:
I found sainsburys to have one of the best systems…go to office…they dedicate a bay…reverse on… lock the cab…hang your keys on a chain by the bay…they pull them up…red light goes on…that stays red until tipped, then goes green or they call your company name when your in the waiting room…keys dropped back down…everyone is safe…except drivers who have to listen to the piffle…unless outside having a smoke or coffee.
Similar thing at LUK, they use an air line lock, the key for that fits the warehouse door, the loader takes the air lock key and hangs it on the door and raises it. You can’t pull off till the door is closed, he can’t open the door until the air line lock is fitted [emoji23]
I worked at United Carriers late 70s and a lad I was at school with used to jump in the back of the vans and start marking the parcels etc with the depot codes, one day he just happened to misjudge it once and trapped his head between the lorry body and the wall, he was hurt but ok, he still is ok, they made him transport manager [emoji14]
rob22888:
Will_161:
I don’t think people think that things like that are ■■■■■■■■. I think it’s the fact you can pull up to these places, have a wheel locking mechanism in place, have to put a Suzie lock on your red line, hand your keys in but then still have to sit in a [zb] waiting room listening to people talk ■■■■■■■■, instead of your comfy cab.The logic behind waiting rooms is more to do with having waiting drivers in a “safe place” and not wandering around a “high risk” yard to & from the toilet/brew machine, out polishing cabs, walking over for a chat with their mate etc.
It’s not totally unreasonable given these fines that get chucked about, my complaint is more with the standard of these waiting rooms and how long your expected to sit in them.
That I understand and it makes sense, they just need to make some of these waiting rooms more humane 
Will_161:
rob22888:
Will_161:
I don’t think people think that things like that are ■■■■■■■■. I think it’s the fact you can pull up to these places, have a wheel locking mechanism in place, have to put a Suzie lock on your red line, hand your keys in but then still have to sit in a [zb] waiting room listening to people talk ■■■■■■■■, instead of your comfy cab.The logic behind waiting rooms is more to do with having waiting drivers in a “safe place” and not wandering around a “high risk” yard to & from the toilet/brew machine, out polishing cabs, walking over for a chat with their mate etc.
It’s not totally unreasonable given these fines that get chucked about, my complaint is more with the standard of these waiting rooms and how long your expected to sit in them.
That I understand and it makes sense, they just need to make some of these waiting rooms more humane
Who pays for them when they get trashed which seems to be a common complaint about the condition?
I do however agree the should be enough chairs for the number of drivers waiting at a minimum
It’s worrying how the different depots around the country, even those of the same firm - seem to have a variety of different patterns of “H&S enforcement” and even simple SSOW rules that vary considerably.
I’ve always thought that these “variances” in methods - end up causing more danger than they prevent.
Say for example, Depot A has a “Hand keys in, no staying in Cab” policy, whereas Depot B has “hand keys in, STAY in cab” policy.
Surely the two would contradict each other, so that visiting drivers can’t get used to either system.
All they do know is that they won’t expect to be taking any legal breaks on bays, meaning all those half-asleep drivers we see attempting to take breaks on service roads because they were obliged to stay in the “Cooler” waiting rooms for hours and hours, when depots are not in much of a hurry to tip and re-load them. 
Drivers get told “No pulling off on a red light” - and yet too many depots don’t seem to have an automatic system where the light goes red, the moment the door is opened. If you were reversing back onto a bay, and some idiot pops open the door to eagerly view the incoming goodies - then guess what? - On an automated system, the light goes red, and the driver stops reversing back…
As for “Docking Clamps” - these are more danger than they are worth. Hit them wrong when reversing back, and the mechanism will frequently jam.
It’s all too frequent that it’s “Those that Do” aka the “Get-on-with-it” EE workers - that’ll consider jumping down, giving it a kick, or whatever - rather than calling a manager away from his solitaire game, diddling his phone, or around the shed having a smoke. You might even get EEs being ordered BY an EE manager - to adopt “corner cutting practice” - which all detracts from the entire H&S aspect we’re all supposed to watch out for.
It’s high time we had a uniform H&S and SSOW that applies are very least too ALL depots of the same company. ENOUGH of this disparity between depots that have all these conflicting, and contradictory systems.
Here’s my idea for a safe system:
Back lorry on bay. Pull on red knob to immobize trailer. Hand in keys.
Once done, you can take your break in the cab to one’s hearts content. Even on a downhill-off bay…
The daftest reason I ever heard for “can’t stay in cab, bruv…” was “You might kick off the handbrake whilst crossing your legs in the cab…” All this on a downhill-ON bay, as well. FFS. You can’t make it up! 
Winseer:
It’s worrying how the different depots around the country, even those of the same firm - seem to have a variety of different patterns of “H&S enforcement” and even simple SSOW rules that vary considerably.
Indeed. There really need to be industry-wide regulations that stipulate an industry-wide procedure.
I do one simple thing in all cases, which is simply apply the trailer brake. There are firms that have all sorts of fancy bay mechanisms, wheel chocks, red-line locks, even forklift drivers who maneouver a metal “stop” sign into place in front of the wagon.
I faintly remember one extraordinary procedure (Morrisons Bellshill maybe?) where you had to take the red line off, wrap it around the handle for the fifth wheel, and then padlock it all in place and hand the padlock key in as well as your ignition keys - or something like that. It’s risible.
And it’s all inefficient overkill for that simple procedure of putting the trailer brake on once you are handing the trailer over into someone else’s charge, and only taking it off again once you are taking charge of the trailer again. Or, if you’re handling the loading yourself, say with a tanker, then the brake goes on before the hose, and the hose comes off before the brake. It’s a simple procedure that is safe in all situations and on each and every site in the country.
I put the trailer brake on even when a particular site doesn’t require me to, in order to maintain the consistency of my own habit. And if the driver can’t be trusted to follow this simple procedure (either because of inattention, confusion, or taking short-cuts), then have a yard man do it, and have him wrap a little warning sign on string onto the brake knob telling the driver to simply keep away from it.
If that simple procedure involving the trailer brake isn’t seen to be safe enough by some sites, perhaps because it has already failed too many times, then there is surely some sort of other H&S problem on that site, including possibly deficient communication, unclear systems, or some other human factor issue.
truckyboy:
I found sainsburys to have one of the best systems…go to office…they dedicate a bay…reverse on… lock the cab…hang your keys on a chain by the bay…they pull them up…red light goes on…that stays red until tipped, then goes green or they call your company name when your in the waiting room…keys dropped back down…everyone is safe…except drivers who have to listen to the piffle…unless outside having a smoke or coffee.
I find the best systems to be the ones where I go on the bay, have the freedom to sit in my cab, eat in the canteen, hold on to my keys then someone comes and tells me I’m loaded/tipped and to go away.
Everyone uses common sense and everyone is safe. And treated like a grown up.