Definition of a standardized skin penetration surrogate for blunt impacts

This paper's goal is to present a surrogate to assess potential skin penetration of blunt impact nonlethal projectiles as a basis for a future NATO standard. The proposed surrogate is made of natural chamois, closed-cell foam and ballistic gelatin. Skin penetration assessment on the surrogate is made on the gelatin. Results from live firings on the surrogate are presented and compared to those from the literature, based on cadavers. A statistical analysis shows that the surrogate results are very comparable to the cadaver ones and reproducible. Some comments are then presented concerning the results and practical considerations concerning the surrogate.