Soldiers are often moved to new locations with little protection from nature or the enemy, for this reason, they often bunker down in old buildings and use what they can to fortify their camps. Nick Boone, a research mechanical engineer with the U.S. Army Corps Of Engineers’ Engineer Research and Development Centre (Try and put that on your CV), has come up with a way to increase their protection in these make-shift camps.
‘Ballistic Wallpaper’ as it has been called, is made up of Kevlar fibre combined with a polymer film. Kevlar is the material used in body armour, and in this instance when combined with an adhesive backing creates a sheet of material that can quickly be put on walls to offer instant protection.
While the name is unofficial and it is still in research and development stage, Boone hopes that this can one day can be produced and fielded in an attempt to save lives. The concept aims to help protect soldiers from when the walls around them are hit. Without the wallpaper, when hit, the wall will send shards of rock and explosive device inwards towards the soldiers bunkered within. The wallpaper acts like a net, containing the rubble and debris and therefore reducing the risk to the soldiers within drastically.
With the ability to instantly reinforce buildings and structures with haste, the wallpaper can help save lives and protect people both in and out of war zones from anything that might cause a building to crumble inwards.
Thank you Phys.org for the information.
