Forklift News – Why is it Always Bad?

Imran Khan is not a household name in the United States, but in cricket-loving countries like Great Britain and Australia, everybody knows the name of this Pakistani cricket player turned-politician. Little wonder, then, that when Imran Khan fell off a forklift at a political rally, it made the headlines around the world.

The forklift was carrying him to the stage at a rally in Lahore when the former cricket star, who, at 61, must be losing some of the agility that he was renowned for, lost his balance and fell 15 feet to the ground. Along the way, he bounced off the roof, hitting his head on an iron bar. 16 stitches later, Khan is feeling better and arguably his fall has given him far more publicity than his speech would have.

Neither the forklift nor the forklift operator were blamed for the incident, but it’s interesting to note that had the lift truck successfully delivered Imran Khan to the stage, the world would never know what mode of transportation he used to get him there. That seems to always be the case with forklifts: if the news isn’t bad, forklifts never make the news.

 

To test the theory, we scoured for more forklift news. These are some of the things we discovered:

1. In Lexington, Kentucky, a forklift fire tied up Lexington firefighters.

2. The Huffington Post revealed that one of the “world’s worst tenants” dropped his landlord’s car with a forklift after he was evicted.

3. In Brownstown township, Michigan, an angry worker allegedly rammed a coworker’s forklift with his forklift after the coworker accidentally bumped into his.

4. In Germany, a man turned his forklift into a “jousting lance” and attempted to spear a coworker with it.

 

Then there were a number of stories about forklift accidents.

It’s doubtful that news outlets have a vendetta against forklifts. Reporters know that bad news sells. Still, it’s too bad that forklifts don’t get more credit for all the positive things they do. Aside from being indispensable to the industry, forklifts are often used in rescue operations; to help clean up after disasters, and to speed up the processes of relief services.

Continuing on through the forklift news, we found this strange reference to forklifts:

Analogies in science writing are like forklift trucks – when used correctly they do a lot of heavy lifting, but if you don’t know what you’re doing you’ll quickly drive them into a wall of laboured metaphors and cause some major damage.

It was in a blog about science writing, of all things, titled, Analogies are like forklift trucks.

Moving on, we learned about a Cheesemonger and son tied to forklift in Williamsburg factory, robbed in New York. Volunteer paramedics, the father, and son were robbed of $300 and their EMS vehicle was used as the getaway car.

After scrolling through 5 pages of forklift news, we gave up. There wasn’t a single article that had anything good to say about forklifts or forklift operators. Although it’s not likely to make the front page, we’ll redress the imbalance and say this:

“Without forklifts and skilled forklift operators, trade and commerce would grind to a halt. Let’s hear it for the unsung heroes of the economy.”