Tank-commanders and the open-hatch...

Yes I beleive armour can stop bullets, I seen a low quality video on video.google.com of a US marine being shot with a sniper. He fell down but he than got up and ran behind the Humvee. Took the bullets square in the chest. It looked like he was in a great deal of pain.

 

You can get different levels of body armour. The weakest will stop only shell fragments and pistol bullets, but the strongest will stop full-power rifle rounds at close range. These involve the use of metal or ceramic plates fitted into the armour. Obviously, the more effective the armour, the bulkier and heavier it becomes.

Tony Williams: Military gun and ammunition website and discussion forum

 

The body armour only needs to be a helmet (with visor) and chest & arm coverings. Why try for a high-tech complex engineering solution when you can use a pencil?*

Drawbacks are that the tank commander would need somewhere inside the tank to store this helmet when he is not outside (and enough space to easily put it on). Or, of course, he could always wear it and simply attach/detach the visor...

And he might get a bit warm, but IIRC most tanks have A/C these days.


*Obviously a referance to the infamous NASA 'space pen' development

 

Would body armor thick enough to reliably stop bullets be too bulky for use in a tank?

How do you it was a snpier rifle, and if you do, what calibre was it?

-- Ricky, read this: http://www.truthorfiction.com/rumors/s/spacepen.htm

 

I doubt it was a snipers rifle. Aren't they rediculas things like .50 cal which I doubt would be stopped by portable body armour?

Could well be a standard rifle or possably just an AK47 round that struck him.

FNG

 

"Sniper rifle" is a rather vague term. I suspose you could define it as "rifles made for specific and selective destruction of targets at long range", with a large diversity of calibers. Most "normal" rifles will fill be adequate for the task, old ones included... Russian and German snipers did not have special guns but used modified Mosin Nagant/Mausers.

 

I dont know I guess I will have to post a link to the video. It is still a possibility he was shot with an AK but I doubt it would be used in single shot.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7180103315963689926&q=Marines+in+iraq

The audio of the video is 11 seconds slow.

 

Why shouldn't an AK be used in single shot?

The video does not prove anything but that the soldiers body armor stopped a single bullet of calibre and velocity.

 

There's only a single shot heard on the sound track, and single-shot capability is available on the AK. At least on mine although the selector runs from "Safe" to "Auto" and then "Single" so that auto fire is the "default setting" once off safe.
There's a video available called "Weapons Effects" in which a guy disproves the Hollywood myth of being knocked over by a rifle round. And he does it in a very spectacular manner - he has a friend shoot him in the stomach with an (IIRC) FN SLR while wearing body armour. From a range of less than three feet! Besides proving that rifle rounds don't knock you down it also demonstrates the effectivenss of body armour quite well...
Yeah, fifty cal weapons are being used as long-range sniper's rifles, apparently US Marines were picking off Iraqi officers in body armour during the Gulf War - at ranges of around 1200 metres. But the majority (at the moment) of sniper rifles are smaller calibre than that - usually 7.62 (but x51 for the West and x 54 for Eastern countries).

 

The 7.62x39 ammo used in the AK-47 can definitely be stopped by good body armour - many lives have been saved through this in Iraq.

The much more powerful 7.62x54R used in Russian-made sniper rifles (Dragunov) and GPMGs is harder to stop, especially if firing AP. It is closely comparable with the 7.62x51 NATO.

This is the list of levels of body armour and what they will stop, supplied to me by Simon Tan:

Level I .32, .380 and some .38 spl.
Level IIA 9mm, 45 ACP, 12 gauge 00 buck, 357 mag etc.
Level II rarely encountered so I ahve no idea what the specs are
Level IIIA Most large handgun calibres, .44 Mag etc. It starts to get stupid with the .460 S&W and other extreme loads.
Level III 5.56NATO ball, 7.62x39 M43 Ball
Level IVA 7.62x51 ball etc.
Level IV 5.56 AP, 7,62 AP....

CRISAT is something like Level III- since it doesn't stop 7.62M43 or M193 5.56 from 50 m but is better at catching fragments than straight aramids. SAPI describes the hard plate or Small Arms Protective Insert that goes into the vest. In the case of the Interceptor used by most of Uncle Sam's lot, the plate itself is not Level III, only when comboed with the carrier. there are plates that are Level III or IV all by themselves. Those things are real heavy.

Tony Williams: Military gun and ammunition website and discussion forum

 

I heard of a US marine getting shot in the head with a Russian sniper rifle probably Druganov. Lucky he was proned and it hit his helmet at the top of his head. Supposedly he only got a concusion.

Oli on the video I do not think it was the bullet that knocked him down. For example if you were walking and someone punched u and u were not expecting it, is it not possible that you could loose ur balance?

 

It must have just hit a glancing blow, then, because any military rifle round getting a solid hit would drill straight through a helmet.

Correct, people don't get physically 'knocked down' by bullets (pace Hollywood Westerns...) but if they were unbalanced anyway it could tip them over.

Tony Williams: Military gun and ammunition website and discussion forum

 

But if a person was shot in certain locations they would probably fall down for example fi you were charging the enemy and you took one straight into the knee. I assume you instantly fall to the ground.

I assume if someone was shot and it was a kill shot they would just pretty much collapse, but than again I ahve no basis for this (never seen it happen).

 

Correct on both counts, except that the only type of 'kill shot' which would drop someone immediately would be to the brain or upper spine. I haven't seen anyone die from being shot either, but from all that I have read, if hit anywhere else - even in the heart - a man can stay on his feet and keep fighting until blood loss causes his blood pressure to drop too low, when he collapses. That can take around 15 seconds.

This is, of course, assuming that the wounds happen in battle when people are hyped up with adrenaline. A civilian who is not expecting violence might collapse on the spot through shock if shot almost anywhere.

Tony Williams: Military gun and ammunition website and discussion forum

 

There was some information published a good few years ago in Challenge magazine with regard to damage caused in role-playing games and its "realism". The authors talked to Marvin Fackler (renowned ballistics expert in the states) and he told of one NYPD (IIRC) cop who died after being shot in the foot with .38!

 

How the bloody hell would that happen? I find that pretty hard to beleive.

Williams what you put in the 2nd paragrpah you posted was exactly what I was thinking reading the 1st.

 

Shock? Bled to death? Lead poisoning?

Then again, some people can take a bullet impact to the head and survive. It does not make it a general rule!

 

Point taken, but still a .38 in the foot?

You forgot infection.

 

I doubt it was infection since the poor guy was DOA at the hospital - most likely shock.

 

The shock could have triggered a heart attack - the most likely explanation IMO. I think that is what generally happens when people are said to 'die of shock'.

Tony Williams: Military gun and ammunition website and discussion forum