Does stopping power work both ways?

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ltc444 said:
Frank were are your three valid sources.
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[1] One source on the issue of psychological stops can be found in this study by Greg Ellifritz.

As Ellifritz note in his discussion of his "failure to incapacitate" data (emphasis added):
Greg Ellifritz said:
...Take a look at two numbers: the percentage of people who did not stop (no matter how many rounds were fired into them) and the one-shot-stop percentage. The lower caliber rounds (.22, .25, .32) had a failure rate that was roughly double that of the higher caliber rounds. The one-shot-stop percentage (where I considered all hits, anywhere on the body) trended generally higher as the round gets more powerful. This tells us a couple of things...

In a certain (fairly high) percentage of shootings, people stop their aggressive actions after being hit with one round regardless of caliber or shot placement. These people are likely NOT physically incapacitated by the bullet. They just don't want to be shot anymore and give up! Call it a psychological stop if you will. Any bullet or caliber combination will likely yield similar results in those cases. And fortunately for us, there are a lot of these "psychological stops" occurring. The problem we have is when we don't get a psychological stop. If our attacker fights through the pain and continues to victimize us, we might want a round that causes the most damage possible. In essence, we are relying on a "physical stop" rather than a "psychological" one. In order to physically force someone to stop their violent actions we need to either hit him in the Central Nervous System (brain or upper spine) or cause enough bleeding that he becomes unconscious. The more powerful rounds look to be better at doing this....
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Also, see the FBI paper entitled "Handgun Wounding Factors and Effectiveness", by Urey W. Patrick. Agent Patrick, for example, notes on page 8:
...Psychological factors are probably the most important relative to achieving rapid incapacitation from a gunshot wound to the torso. Awareness of the injury..., fear of injury, fear of death, blood or pain; intimidation by the weapon or the act of being shot; or the simple desire to quit can all lead to rapid incapacitation even from minor wounds. However, psychological factors are also the primary cause of incapacitation failures.

The individual may be unaware of the wound and thus have no stimuli to force a reaction. Strong will, survival instinct, or sheer emotion such as rage or hate can keep a grievously wounded individual fighting....
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And for some more insight into wound physiology and "stopping power":
  • Dr. V. J. M. DiMaio (DiMaio, V. J. M., M. D., Gunshot Wounds, Elsevier Science Publishing Company, 1987, pg. 42, as quoted in In Defense of Self and Others..., Patrick, Urey W. and Hall, John C., Carolina Academic Press, 2010, pg. 83):
    In the case of low velocity missles, e. g., pistol bullets, the bullet produces a direct path of destruction with very little lateral extension within the surrounding tissue. Only a small temporary cavity is produced. To cause significant injuries to a structure, a pistol bullet must strike that structure directly. The amount of kinetic energy lost in the tissue by a pistol bullet is insufficient to cause the remote injuries produced by a high-velocity rifle bullet.
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  • And further in In Defense of Self and Others... (pp. 83-84, emphasis in original):
    The tissue disruption caused by a handgun bullet is limited to two mechanisms. The first or crush mechanism is the hole that the bullet makes passing through the tissue. The second or stretch mechanism is the temporary wound cavity formed by the tissue being driven outward in a radial direction away from the path of the bullet. Of the two, the crush mechanism is the only handgun wounding mechanism that damages tissue. To cause significant injuries to a structure within the body using a handgun, the bullet must penetrate the structure.
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  • And further in In Defense of Self and Others... (pp. 95-96, emphasis in original):
    Kinetic energy does not wound. Temporary cavity does not wound. The much-discussed "shock" of bullet impact is a fable....The critical element in wounding effectiveness is penetration. The bullet must pass through the large blood-bearing organs and be of sufficient diameter to promote rapid bleeding....Given durable and reliable penetration, the only way to increase bullet effectiveness is to increase the severity of the wound by increasing the size of the hole made by the bullet....
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  • Urey Patrick was in the FBI for some 24 years, 12 of which were in the firearms training unit where he rose to the position of Assistant Unit Chief. John Hall is an attorney who spent 32 years in the FBI, including serving as a firearms instructor and a SWAT team member.
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[2] The circumstances of the 1986 Miami FBI shoot-out are fairly well known, but there's a good discussion in a Wikipedia article. An abstract of Dr. W. French Anderson's forensic analysis can be found here. And this (Part 1 and Part II) FBI training video on the subject is interesting.

From the Wikipedia article:
....As Platt climbed out of the passenger side car window, one of Dove's 9 mm rounds hit his right upper arm and went on to penetrate his chest, stopping an inch away from his heart. The autopsy found Platt’s right lung was collapsed and his chest cavity contained 1.3 liters of blood, suggesting damage to the main blood vessels of the right lung. Of his many gunshot wounds, this first was the primary injury responsible for Platt’s eventual death....
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From the Anderson article:
...As Platt crawled through the passenger side window, one of Dove’s 9mm bullets hit his right upper arm, just above the inside crook of the elbow. ....The bullet exited the inner side of his upper arm near the armpit, penetrated his chest between the fifth and sixth ribs, and passed almost completely through the right lung before stopping. The bullet came to a rest about an inch short of penetrating the wall of the heart.
...


At autopsy, Platt’s right lung was completely collapsed and his chest cavity contained 1300 ml of blood, suggesting damage to the main blood vessels of the right lung. Dr. Anderson believes that Platt’s first wound (right upper arm/chest wound B) was unsurvivable, and was the primary injury responsible for Platt’s death....
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[3] In my prior post I linked to the source of the information on Stacy Lim.
 
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Scorch said:
...So my philosophy... shoot to kill...
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Bad idea. We shoot to stop, not to kill. Shooting to stop could result in the death of the assailant, and we must accept that. But our goal is not to kill; it is to stop.

If one shoots an attacker, and he stops but is still breathing, finishing him off becomes murder.
 
And to add... If you do not lawyer up and you opt to speak to investigating LEA... "I shot to kill the scumbag" could be used against you in court far better and easier than "I drew my weapon and made the conscious decision that I had to stop this threat against myself and family so I fired..."

Brent
 
I am new to this forum but my guess is that the concept of "Stopping Power" has been discussed ad nausea um on this forum.

I think one of the points that Frank Etten cites in his response that the "shock" effect is minimal should clearly be attributed to handgun rounds only.

The "cavitation effect" from high V bullet rounds from a rifle is devastating. when we go through surgical training we mange High V gunshot wounds surgicly by doing dead tissue debridmonts - the amount of "Jello" and devitalized tissue in the GSW track is pretty self explanatory to anyone into terminal ballistics.

As mentioned by the poster of a previous response (physics work both ways) YOU CANT BEAT PHYSICS

The energy imparted by the bullet has to abide by the law of energy E=MC2 in the world of ballistic energy mass isnt the big dog on the block its Speed because the speed is squared

anything going supersonic will screw you up.

the other physics that hollywood producers cant grasp is that no one is thrown backwards by a small arms shot - for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. If the BG is thrown backwards then the shooter must aslo be thrown backwards if he hangs on to his weapon.

and I think that all bullets are not equal. The way the round acts once it comes in contact with the body has a lot to say about how the BG's day will go.

I don't remember the name of the study but it was done in Switzerland and they shot something like 200 goats to test lethality.

Because of that study I carry either MAGSAFES or GLAZERs and will not carry stuff like combat talons because of that studies data.

Question - before I posted I was trying to find the DOJ study on GSW to the head that showed a ridiculously low "put down" rate from handguns. Anyone have that?

we stopped doing the "mozambique / el presidente drills to the head after that study and started third tapping the pelvic girdle after that one
 
sfmedic said:
...I think one of the points that Frank Etten cites in his response that the "shock" effect is minimal should clearly be attributed to handgun rounds only...
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[1] Please spell my name correctly.

[2] And yes, our focus is handgun rounds. The focus of our discussions is self defense by private citizens, including the carrying of firearms by private citizens for self defense. That most commonly involves handguns.

[3] All the material I cited and quoted very clearly relates to handgun rounds.

sfmedic said:
...The energy imparted by the bullet has to abide by the law of energy E=MC2 in the world of ballistic energy mass isnt the big dog on the block its Speed because the speed is squared...
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[1] And that equation has absolutely nothing to do with the subject we are discussing, nor does it describe ballistic energy.

[2] That equation is useful do describe the energy produced in nuclear reactions when a small amount of matter is lost and is converted to energy.

[3] The factor "c" is not speed. It is rather the speed of light (roughly 186,000 miles/second). The speed of light is a common constant in many equations of physics, and the letter "c" is commonly used in physics equations to refer to the speed of light.

sfmedic said:
...Because of that study I carry either MAGSAFES or GLAZERs and will not carry stuff like combat talons because of that studies data....
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It is however my understanding that these bullets have very poor reputations for penetration. While they can make ghastly appearing superficial wounds, they sometimes do not adequately penetrate to major blood vessels or blood rich organs.
 
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That video is not relevant to this conversation. Those people were shooting a big game rifle of some kind. The recoil energy is knocking them down because they don't know how to shoot big bore rifles.
 
You don't classify a big game rifle as a "small arm"?. I didn't see anything over 20 millimeter (.79 caliber).

Regardless of their technique, SOMETHING was throwing them backwards. Do you believe that there is a certain "technique" for the target to use that will keep it from absorbing the same amount of recoil from the impact of the bullet?

Guns are generally classified according to use, size, and tradition. This varies among the military services. The basic distinction is between small arms and artillery. Any gun below a 20-millimeter bore size is generally classified as a small arm.
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http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/ground/small-arms.htm
 
It's not technique on the reciving end. It's smaller surface area, less mass and greater velocity. That all adds up to equal penetration and that won't throw a person to the floor. Life aint a John Woo movie and all the videos of rich Arabs dropping a .577 won't change that.
 
That all adds up to equal penetration and that won't throw a person to the floor. Life aint a John Woo movie and all the videos of rich Arabs dropping a .577 won't change that.
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You believe that the bullet penetration equals the rifle movement????

If you understood simple physics (MV1 = MV2, assuming a non-elastic collision) and knew why a ballistic pendulum works the way it does, you wouldn't be wondering why the rich Arabs were dropping the rifle or what was happening at the other end.
 
Does "stopping power" work both ways?

Although the term "stopping power" is so nebulous as to be meaningless, in a word, the answer is "yes".

The problem is that it may not when you most need it. ;)
 
I do "physics and stuff" for a living, and I am withholding comment, as I've come to be of the opinion that people are far more inclined to believe what they want, than to learn what is so.

Even so ... simple experiment for the uninitiated:
  • Buy an icepick.
  • Buy any good-sized roast.,
  • Place the pointy end of the ice pick on the thickest part of the roast.
  • Slam the palm of your hand on the back of the ice pick's handle.
  • Note that equal force is being applied at both ends of the ice pick ... you know, all that stuff about equal and opposite reaction.
  • Note that the pointy end of the ice pick penetrates the roast, and the handle does not penetrate your hand.
  • Figure out why, and you'll know why a rifle can knock the shooter on his butt, but the fired projectile can't.
 
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45_Auto said:
Regardless of their technique, SOMETHING was throwing them backwards. Do you believe that there is a certain "technique" for the target to use that will keep it from absorbing the same amount of recoil from the impact of the bullet?
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This argument needs to end.

I know you believe it but it's simply not true.

The physics tell us otherwise, experiments confirm the math and real life confirms the experiments.

Watch this video

The guy gets shot, point-blank, in the chest, by a 7.62x51 (basically a .308), while standing on one foot.

Arguing that bullets knock people down is like arguing that the earth is flat and the moon is made of cheese.

It's simply not true. Arguing that it is true has long ago crossed into the realm of silliness.
 
You believe that all these guys getting thrown backwards were faking it?
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They are not faking it, but that rifle is more or less an experiment in how much a human can take, it's not a commercial venture. It puts out about the same power as a .50BMG but without any muzzle brake, and without the 30-40lb weight of a typical .50BMG rifle.

However, even taking a bullet from a .50BMG won't knock you down.

Here's some photographic proof.

http://www.therallypoint.org/forum/index.php?topic=6290.0
 
Using the same inaccurate thought, no bullet will penetrate a human since the butt stock doesn't blow the arm slap off the shooter???:rolleyes:

Brent
 
I don't remember the name of the study but it was done in Switzerland and they shot something like 200 goats to test lethality.
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Strausborg (sp?) tests, chronicled in one (or more) of M&S's books. Some :rolleyes: believe they were never actually conducted; others believe that their conclusions are largely irrelevant to actual human-v.-human armed encounters. At best, the conclusions are controversial and inconclusive.

Because of that study I carry either MAGSAFES or GLAZERs (sic) and will not carry stuff like combat talons because of that studies (sic) data
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Yeah, about 30 years ago I bought in to the MagSafe/Glaser PR hype.

Spent an awful of money on that ammo and shot a bunch of it (worked great on paper :) ). I kept reading...and in time, concluded that I was a perfect example of PT Barnum's First Law.

If you or anyone else can point me toward any reputable source that recommends using, or any LE that actually uses these rounds, I am listening.
 
Lemme add...

The title might be misleading to some replying here... It doesn't imply "Does the gun harm equally at both ends"... Maybe this is the reason for the derailment of the original topic...:rolleyes:

Maybe a re-read is in order for context comprehension???

Brent
 
To answer the OP, I haven't met anyone who fears the effectiveness of their sd round or thinks the evildoers in the night are superior shots with superior weaponry. Rather the opposite is what I hear and read on TFL. People here seem sure of themselves and confident in their choice of firearm/ammo. That is unless the topic is a rifle for sd then it's overpenetration ad nauseam.
 
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Someone already beat me to it, but I believe our practice of assuming BG's soak up bullets and we go down after 1 is just looking at the worst possible outcome.
You don't want to depend on one bullet putting down the BG.
You don't want to depend on still being in the fight after you take one.

You should hope for the best, but plan for the worst.

For the opposing viewpoint (bullet proof good guys and bad guys that can't shoot and go down easy) you can watch pretty much any action movie.
 
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