Are You Wearing Your Body Armor Backwards?August 03, 2010 by
Rod DornsifeAs strange as it may sound, there is a very good chance that you, or one of your fellow officers, will go on duty tonight wearing body armor that may provide far less ballistic protection than expected. Modern body armor is designed to protect the wearer from deadly high-velocity handgun rounds using a sophisticated combination of bullet-stopping materials, strategies and tactics. Unfortunately, these highly sophisticated panel structures are usually directional in nature. That means if they were shot from the opposite or back side, the complex methods they use to stop bullets and protect officers become all but useless.
Read More »Body armor is changing for the better, thanks to new performance standards set by the National Institute of Justice (NIJ). The NIJ is the research, development and evaluation agency of the U.S. Department of Justice and is dedicated to researching crime-control and justice issues. The new NIJ Standard-0101.06, as it’s officially called, specifies revised minimum-performance requirements that body armor must meet to satisfy the needs of criminal-justice agencies. It also establishes the methods that are used to test this performance. The updated standard and testing procedures ensure that officers will be getting the best body armor and the most comprehensive protection available.
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