SecurityDriver News

Got this email from Sean Wang of International Armored Group, Sean was responding the May 9^th VR Armored Vehicle Classification Post

Sean wanted to elaborate a bit more on the issue. Here is what he had to say.

 Basically, the BRV 2009 VR7 certificate validates the vehicle armoring design by putting the vehicle through live ballistic testing.  Anyone can basically purchase certified ballistic steel and ballistic glass and install it on a vehicle, the challenge lies in the design and integration of the armoring so that the passenger cabin is fully sealed to prevent penetration from any projectiles.  Also, please note that under the BRV 2009 standard, VR7 is equivalent to the B6 level of armoring, not B7.  This is a common misconception due to the change in nomenclature.

In my opinion the only way to test an armoured vehicle is by shooting at the vehicle. As you can imagine this is expensive. The manufacture destroys the vehicle in the testing process. Take a look at the videos at the end of the article.

 I also wanted to mention that the blast testing is not a part of the BRV 2009 standards, which strictly covers ballistic threats.  Most of our armored vehicles are being used for operations in Afghanistan and Iraq where explosives are the most prominent threat.  Many organizations require certain levels of blast protection as well for their vehicles, which is the reason why we conducted additional testing even though it was not necessary to obtain the VR7 certificate.

 Sean sent along couple of demonstration videos of our vehicle ballistic and blast testing – I’m impressed.

The International Armored Group Web Site

Sean’s email sean.wang@interarmored.com

A while back I contributed a short article to the “Training Log Book” by Rob Pincus. Rob came up with a rather unique and ingenious idea, a book that documents your training.  The book contains over 2 dozen essays from training industry professionals offering their advice in regard to defensive and tactical training. Whether you do a little or allot of training the book is a must. The essays are worth the price of the book.

For more info

In the process of a putting together an iPhone Application about vehicle attacks I came across this You Tube video. It is a re-enactment of the 1978 Moro kidnapping.  At the time, the kidnapping of the highly respected elder statesman of Italian politics, Aldo Moro, shocked the world. This incident would be similar to the kidnapping of one of our former Presidents. Although the Moro attack occurred more than 30 years ago it is still a lesson learned scenario.  

This event (plus the Schleyer ambush) had a profound effect on the security community. To gain an understanding of the historical significance of this attack we need to examine the security industry the 70’s.

Some History – During the 1970’s these types of attacks had been occurring often in South America, the prevailing attitude was that it would never spread beyond those borders.  Although the terrorism experts at the time (there were maybe three of them), had all been predicting this type of attack was going to spread, and become prolific. No one paid much attention to them, and the general feeling was that the terrorist were not that good – and that if you put a guy with gun sitting next to the chauffer, and maybe some guys with more guns in a vehicle following the boss the problem is solved. At the time the general thinking of the non security community was that the enemy was not that smart.  The following is an actual comment from an executive “After all we are dealing with unsophisticated rabble”.

 Lessons –  Moro was one of the attacks that brought to light that terrorist actually plan what they do. You can see from this re-enactment that these guys, and girl, had their act together.

This was one of the attacks that made the “powers to be” come to the conclusion that –

 Having guys with guns with the boss doesn’t solve the problem – it creates a different problem

 We ought to train those guys that are protecting the principal – drivers and shooters should be trained to drive and shoot

Armored cars are a good thing – we are talking about 1970’s armored cars that were a lot less sophisticated than they are now.

The protection team was expendable

 This is a question – not a comment – have things changed that much in thirty years?  What do you think?