Airsoft Pellets - Pellet Ballistics - Dangers To Humans

Dangers To Humans

Airsoft pellets typically leave small lesions (welts) on exposed skin with human targets. While mildly painful, pellets are not typically damaging to the skin. Eye protection is universally mandatory to prevent damage to eyes. It is also often recommended that full face masks and body protection be used during airsoft matches to protect the players' teeth and ears.

Experiments on bullets allow to estimate the minimum velocity for a airsoft pellet to penetrate in skin (where penetration means that the spherical pellet enters more than half in the skin). In 1978, it was measured that the critical velocity to skin penetration can empirically be given by:

where m is the mass of a spherical bullet, in grams. This means that a typical 0.2g airsoft pellet will penetrate skin at 136.7 metres per second (448 ft/s), or 1.87J.

The following excerpts are from the United Kingdom Parliament's "Principles of firearms control", Home Affairs Select Committee Second Report, 6 April 2000, expound on the level of danger involved with low-energy projectiles:

"25. The Firearms Act 1968 defines a firearm "a lethal barreled weapon of any description from which any shot, bullet or other :missile can be discharged". In this context, a "lethal weapon" means a weapon capable of firing a projectile with sufficient :force to inflict more than a trivial injury, i.e. with a force sufficient to puncture the skin. The force with which a firearm :is able to deliver a projectile is normally expressed in terms of the kinetic energy it generates at its muzzle—the "muzzle energy". :This energy is normally expressed in units of foot-pounds (ft·lbs) or joules (J). "26. The Home Office and the Forensic Science Service considers that the lowest level of muzzle energy capable of inflicting a penetrating wound is one foot pound force (1.35 J): below these power levels, weapons are "incapable of penetrating even vulnerable parts of the body, such as the eye". However, more recent analysis by the Forensic Science Agency for Northern Ireland has indicated that a more reasonable assessment of the minimum muzzle energy required to inflict a penetrating wound lies between 2.2 and 3.0 ft·lbf (3 to 4 J). We will deal more fully with this discrepancy at paragraphs 123 to 130 below." "123. The power level at and above which an air weapon is considered a firearm in law is presently set at 1 ft·lbf. However, we note above that the Forensic Science Agency of Northern Ireland has more recently assessed the power level at which a barreled weapon is capable of inflicting a lethal wound as between 2.2 and 3 ft·lbf, and the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland has proposed that the law relating to firearms in Northern Ireland be amended to take this into account."

On another document also regarding firearms, "The Eleventh Annual Report of the Firearms Consultative Committee", the penetration levels lies between 2 and 3 J based on a research for US Army and DiMaio's work in "Minimal Velocities Necessary for Perforation of Skin by Air Pellets and Bullets, Journal of Forensic Sciences".