EmergencyTech.org

After 9/11 workers were exposed to all manner of toxins. During the recovery even those well away from Ground Zero, those who were working on mortuary details for example, were exposed to unsafe levels of Asbestos.

In March of last year, New York City paramedic Deborah Reeve died of mesothelioma, an asbestos-related form of cancer. There is little doubt she was first exposed to asbestos on Sept. 11, 2001, when she responded to the scene at Ground Zero.

There is equally little doubt that she continued to be assaulted by the substance sometime during the next eight months when she was assigned to the morgue, where she helped medical examiners do body-part identification.

Dr. Emily Craig, Kentucky’s forensic anthropologist, had already given a lot of thought to the problem of contaminated corpses before the World Trade Center was attacked. But she stood endless days in the same morgue as Deborah Reeve. She breathed the same air while combing bags of rubble for slivers of bones so that DNA could name what remained.

“Ziplock-like” body bag technology developed by Dr. Craig attempts to address the issue of cross contamination from handling remains.

No Comments »

Via Business Week:

Today’s versions of body armor are composed mostly of 20 to 30 layers of synthetic fibers. And while there is no question the death toll for American troops in Iraq would be far higher without it, the gear is bulky and can’t stop high-velocity bullets, for example, or all bomb fragments. Even as DuPont was field-testing the original Kevlar jackets in the early 1970s, researchers were hunting for lighter, tougher ballistic fabrics. Since then, companies have investigated a chemist’s kit of exotic materials, from cloned spider silk — a wonder of lightness and strength — to newfangled sheets of carbon nanotubes that are among the toughest structures in nature. Israeli researchers at one company, ApNano Materials Inc. in New York, have shown off a breastplate of nanometals said to be five times as strong as steel.

Armor Holdings’ product is different from all of the above. Developed by Norman Wagner, a professor of chemical engineering at the University of Delaware’s Center for Composite Materials, it’s a mix of polyethylene glycol, a polymer found in laxatives and other consumer products, and nanobits of silica, or purified sand. Together they produce a “sheer-thickening liquid” that stiffens instantly into a shield when hit hard by an object. It reverts to its liquid state just as fast when the energy from the projectile dissipates.

The liquid has other pluses. It’s lighter than Kevlar and other widely used fabrics. That means Armor Holdings’ new vests, in which the substance would be sandwiched between layers of ballistic fibers, might be lighter than current versions, which weigh four pounds or more. It also should be cheaper to manufacture, says Schiller. The Jacksonville (Fla.) company wants to continue to sell entry-level garments for $500 to $600.

It will initially be marketed towards corrections officers who face the constant threat of stabbings.

The concept of a “sheer-thickening liquid” is interesting to say the least; however, this program’s relationship to Armor Holdings and the Natick Soldier Systems Center makes me a bit nervous especially in the wake of the Pinnacle Armor SOV/Dragon Skin vs. Interceptor armor controversy that we’ll be covering soon. Until then check out Defense Review’s coverage of NSSC’s wrangling at the expense of U.S. soldiers’ safety.

No Comments »

No Comments »

Lt. Frank Borelli has had a chance to try out the gimmicky sounding “Rapid Deplyment Body Armor Bag” from Rapid Deployment Protection Systems, Inc. The bag (pictured here) is designed to carry a Patrol Assault Rifle, an increasingly common piece of hardware in police vehicles ever since the introduction of the Active Shooter / Immediate Response (ASIR) doctrine that gained popularity in the wake of the Columbine High School and North Hollywood Bank shootings.

The bag addresses some key needs that other systems have not yet met, according to Frank Borelli of Borelli Consulting:

Well, there are several things to immediately consider when adding a “patrol rifle” to an officer’s equipment:

1) Training and qualification with the rifle

2) Transportation and storage of the rifle

3) Adequate armor to stop the ammo fired from the rifle

Oh, yeah - forgot that last one didn’t we? When we consider equipping a patrol officer with a rifle the first two items listed are obvious. It’s that last one we seem to neglect. One of the first rules of body armor is to make sure that it stops your own duty load. Is there any reason why that shouldn’t apply to the patrol rifle? …

In less than 30 seconds I went from carrying a rifle bag to wearing body armor that covered my whole torso and most of my lower abdomen / groin. The armor had a POLICE patch on both front and back. I was rifle in hand with four magazines available for reload and two extra magazines for my pistol. I looked at her and told her, “This is the single most innovative piece of equipment I’ve seen in the past ten years if not longer.”

Via Defense Review

1 Comment »

The TS-1 security glove (scroll down, they don’t provide a direct link) offers a high level of protection from and concealable detection of metallic objects in a small, convenient package. The kevlar lined gloves prevent injury and exposure from knives and needles while containing sensors that alert the person performing the search to the presence of such objects.

The TS-Mitt is a similar device that doesn’t offer the same stick protection but promises more comfort and sensitivity for the user. Both devices, however, make for much faster searches by performing physical search with metal detection at the same time.

Via Tech Security Limited

No Comments »