Man Survives Freak Forklift Accident
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FORT WORTH (CBSDFW.COM ) - Some anxious moments in Fort Worth today when a forklift overturned on top of its driver.
Firefighters tell us the man is a contract employee who had material atop the forklift and knew right away that he was in trouble. "He had a load up in the air and was backing with it and the counterbalance rolled over," Fort Worth Fire Department Capt. J.W. Brunson told CBS 11 News.
Arlington firefighters were first on the scene but the forklift was angled in such a way that moving it straight up might have hurt the man worse. Fort Worth's Rescue-14 then used air-filled bladders to gingerly lift the forklift off him. That done, he was flown by Careflite to the hospital.
"He was in stable condition when he left the scene," according to Brunson, who was in charge of the Rescue 14 operation. "I know he did have a leg injury, pretty significant leg injury."
Brunson gave us an up-close demonstration of the technique he and his crew used to pick up the forklift. It involves these flattened out bladders that can be inflated with compressed air. "Same as we wear on our air packs at fires. And we're able to put high pressure into this and inflate the bags," he said.
But it's not just the bags. Wooden 4x4s called cribbings are used to stabilize the lift in case the bag should suddenly deflate. Kind of like jack stands for cars. "We have saying, 'Lift an inch, crib an inch,'" Bruson told us.
The bag shown in our demonstration was actually twice as tall as what was needed to move the forklift. When stabilized it was easy to move the victim.
Rescue 14 has inflatable air bags in numerous sizes it keeps on the truck. Brunson said his crew can lift 74 tons if necessary.
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