The extent of tissue destruction is typically determined by the degree of bullet distortion. The concept of “stopping power” was developed on this foundation.
A lot of research has gone into determining the “desired attributes” of bullets that law enforcement agencies should utilize to optimize stopping power. A projectile that rapidly deforms, expends most if not all of its kinetic energy, and causes maximum interior tissue destruction is now usually seen as preferable to one that does not deform, creates a fine trail through the body, escapes, and potentially strikes someone else in the process.
In the 1970s, a large debate erupted over police departments’ use of hollow-point handgun ammunition. The objections against its use were mostly emotive, with reports of “mutilating wounds” and organs reduced to “unidentifiable minced meat.” The majority of the arguments heard in favour of and against hollow-point pistol ammunition were based on falsehoods, erroneous assumptions, and second-hand accounts circulated by both opponents and supporters of this type of ammunition.
Most police departments in the United States employed handguns chambered for the.38 Special cartridge from its introduction in 1902 until the late 1970s.
The traditional.38 Special cartridge used a 158 grain all-lead round-nose bullet that travelled at 700–850 feet per second. They believed that this round lacked stopping power.
They mentioned a number of incidents in which officers used this cartridge in self- defense but were unable to stop their attackers before they hurt the officer or an innocent bystander.
A pistol cartridge that would stop a person “dead in his tracks” was what police agencies wanted. Of course, there isn’t and never will be such a handgun cartridge. Stopping a person is dependent not only on the qualities of a cartridge, but also on the organ(s) wounded, the severity of the wound(s), and the physiologic makeup of the person shot.
When a pistol bullet strikes a tissue, it produces injuries by three mechanisms:
(1) directly crushing and shredding a wound track equal to the diameter of the bullet, (2) creating a temporary cavity, and (3) fragmentation of the bullet. These actions
result in both anatomic and physiologic injuries that impair the function of the organs
affected. In actuality, the temporary cavity formation and fragmentation of the bullet, if
any, provide nothing or at most minimally to the extent and severity of the wound from
a pistol bullet.
If a 9 mm hollow-point bullet expands (mushrooms) to 12 mm in passing through an
organ, the amount of tissue crushed and shredded will, theoretically, be greater than if the
bullet did not expand or if it was a solid bullet.point does not, the solid or nonexpanding bullet may cause equal, if not greater, direct tissue injury. Solid bullets may be even deadlier than mushrooming rounds. Because mushrooming bullets mushroom, they often do not penetrate as deeply as solid rounds. The solid bullet is more harmful than the hollow point if the aorta is 14 in. from the skin surface and the mushrooming bullet stops after 12 in. of penetration but the solid bullet continues for 18 in.
There is no empirical proof that in real-life scenarios, bullet mushrooming plays a substantial impact in boosting the bullet’s lethality or stopping power.
A projectile that has been cross etched at its tip to assist early deformation inside the body for the goal of improving “stopping power” as seen in Dum Dum bullets.
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