Re: .380 vs. 9mm --same stopping power?

Peter McMullen wrote:

# A bullet's performance hitting a vest is very different from
# its performance in soft tissue. The impact is spread out by
# the vest over a large surface area, which in turn causes the
# vest to impact the body over a large surface area.

Now that is just plain silly with no foundation.  Care to explain how a 
vest could impact a body that it is tightly strapped to and what factual 
information that drew you to this conclusion?


#When a
# bullet impacts body tissue, it creates a temporary cavity
# which is usually of no physiological wounding significance
# (as most organ tissue is elastic enough to tolerate the
# stretch and it only lasts for milliseconds); and it creates
# a permanent cavity, which is a combination of the bullet's
# diameter as it expands, and its penetration crushing tissue. 

Left out is the most critical part, the destruction of nerves and tissue 
cause by hydraulic shock waves.  As the body is made up of millions of 
tiny electrical nerves it is the disruption of these nerves that causes 
the body to loose control and go into shock.  Depending on someone to 
bleed to death internally was pretty much abandoned about the same time 
as the Bow and Arrow.

# 
# That the LEO "said he "dropped like a rock" is of little
# value. 

Your grounds for this conclusion?


#It could simply have been due to the wind being
# knocked out of him, or it could have been psychological, or
# perhaps it whacked him right on top of his spine. 

A lot of could have been remarks  but none apply that I can see.


#In any
# case, that single incident of a 95 grain bullet hitting a
# vest is not much value in determining the relative
# performance of handgun ammo penetrating tissue.

Correct, but who said it was.

# 
# #> Second case
  - snip -
# #> 
# Ahh, so the guy screamed in pain and dropped to his knees.
# Do you agree with Jeff's measure of "stopping power"? Sounds
# like a primarily psychological impact to me. Any bullet
# entering a body will cause pain. And if your attacker is
# resistant to pain, on drugs or drunk, or pumped on
# andrenalyn and endorphins, or if the shot has to be made
# from a less ideal angle, or through heavy clothing, or heavy
# body fat?
# 
# Sorry but Jeff Santee's anecdotes' only moral seems to be
# the .380 scares people, may knock the wind out of you if you
# are wearing a vest, may inflict pain, may penetrate
# intestines at least towards the front of a body of unknown
# size and obesity and unknown clothing and unknown shooting
# angle; and does not seem to cause rapid blood loss.

In both cases the person shot was put out of action weren't they.  I've 
always thought that was the intent.  Sorry but all you have managed to 
do is take a post from one person and add a bunch of your own "maybe 
this or maybe that" statements with no valid proof to disprove being 
shot by a 380 actually put these two individuals out of a fight.

# 
# I love the "most data seems to suggest that the .380 is
# about a 60% one stop cartridge" Where he gets that B.S. I
# have no clue, since he did not cite any references, let
# alone any peer reviewed studies.
# 

You mean like this one =  http://www.powernet.net/~eich1/sp.html

or this one =  http://www.evanmarshall.com/commentary.asp

and this one = http://www.chuckhawks.com/handgun_power_chart.htm

There are hundreds of these sites in the event you wish to do your own 
search.  I'm certainly not endorsing any of these as facts but you did 
say Jeff was putting out B.S didn't you.  BTW, maybe you might be able 
to point me in the direction of some sites you use that say a 380 can't 
possible take out a police officer  wearing a vest or a would be 
attacker since I have no clue where you are getting your 
....err......information.

Jerry




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