Posted on 07/25/2003 4:27:00 AM PDT by heckler
That idea of "dumping 100% of kinetic energy" into a target is a little misleading and not necessarily important.
In order to incapacitate, a bullet has to penetrate and either strike some element of the central nervous system (i.e., the brain or the spinal cord) or cause incapacity through loss of blood.
There is simply not enough "kinetic energy" in for example a 9mm bullet to knock someone down - if there were, simple physics tells you that the same "punch" would be delivered to the person holding the firearm as well.
Therefore, the one and only reason for rounds such as the Glaser Safety Slug is to prevent overpenetration and striking innocent bystanders, either in an urban street environment or in a building with (typically) flimsy walls.
Suppose a bullet weighs 10 grams and a firearm weighs 1kg, and 454.5Nm of energy is expended pushing them apart. Then the bullet will be accellerated to 300m/s for a kinetic energy of 450nM, while the firearm will be accellerated to 3m/s for a kinetic energy of 4.5nM.
Although the momentum imparted to bullet and firearm will both be equal 3kg m/s, the amount of kinetic energy imparted to each will be very different.
>>There is simply not enough "kinetic energy" in for example a 9mm bullet to knock someone down<<
While I don't necessarily disagree with this, how many 9MM have you shot? I've probably run any number of thousands of rounds out of a 9mm. The Recoil is strong. Not as strong as a 44 it's still strong. I'll suggest that the recoil is stronger than most folks could forward with their fist...and I've seen people knock others down with their fist.
There's no question that a 44, or a 45 or even a 38(depending on circumstances)can punch harder, a 9mm is a good kill weapon.
Of course, my weapon of choice is a 12ga sabot hollow point. No one lives thru that...limb blowing off variety shells.
Since the only reason for pilots to be armed is to defend the cockpit, isn't the best way to do that to shoot the bastards before they can get into the cockpit and/or close enough to take the pistol away?
TSA is requiring entirely too much training, and requiring of it people who already know more than enough to defend the cockpit with a handgun. For you see that helps cut down on the number of armed pilots, and neither Tom Ridge,Norm Minetta, the original pick for the TSA, former BATF chief John Magaw, or the current TSA head (Admiral) James M. Loy , ever wanted an armed pilots program. They would rather lose an airplane and all the passengers and crew, than admit that armed civilians could play a role in the struggle against the islamofacists.
It's not an issue. The cabin pressurization valve on the typical airliner is larger than any bullet hole, or even a magazine full of them. This valve opens and closes to maintain cabin pressure. It would merely close a bit to compensate for the air bled out through the bullet hole or holes. Even a window will not completely blow out if holed by a bullet, but even if it did, the cabin would not depressurize instantly. The masks would pop out, the passengers would don them and the crew would fly to a lower altitude.
Yes they did. The KC-10 (just a commercial DC-10 with some "customizing" :) ) which is a pretty old aircraft design, has a pressurization valve about the size of a normal aircraft window. The guy in the office next to mine used to be a crew chief on KC-10s and tells me that you could easily look out through the partially open valve. C-5's (at least as old a basic design) have notoriously leaking rear ramp-doors. The crews would stuff the edges with tarps or blankets, which would sometimes be sucked right out. :)
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