StemCell Therapy

The United States has experienced a week of outrage following the killing of George Floyd. Protestors have turned out daily in most major cities to demand an end to police brutality and justice for Floyd and other Black Americans, including Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery, who have died at the hands of racial injustice.

As crowds reach the thousands, police and other law enforcement officials have started using extreme measures of crowd control, like pepper spray, tear gas, and rubber bullets.

Whats more, videos all over social media have documented the use of flash-bang grenades to subdue crowds. The controversial explosive has been used against protestors in Seattle, Cleveland, Washington, D.C., and other major cities. NBC News correspondent Jo Ling Kent, was actually hit by a flash-bang as she reported live from Seattle.

This content is imported from Twitter. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site.

But what, exactly, are flash-bang grenades and how do they work? Heres what you need to know about them and injuries they can cause.

Also known as stun grenade, a flash-bang is a non-lethal explosive device that emits an extremely loud bang and bright lights to disorient people as it goes off. They can cause temporary blindness and shifts in hearing, typically lasting a few seconds, per a paper in the American Journal of Operations Research.

There are various types of flash-bangs used for different circumstances, but the type police turn to for crowd control are aerial flash-bangs, which can fly between 20 to 30 feet into the air and advance 50 to 300 meters. There is little regulation and transparency for how these devices are tested, according to an Oregon Public Broadcasting report. Especially when used in urban areas, experts say the trajectory of a flash-bang may be unpredictable due to wind currents.

So while flash-bangs can be used in crowd control circumstances, they are controversial. In February, North Carolinas Supreme Court declared flash-bangs weapons of mass destruction, ruling that it is an explosive and incendiary weapon.

AFPGetty Images

Flash-bangs produce a stunningly loud sound, and that has the potential to cause hearing loss if it hits near you, says Ashley Larrimore, M.D., an emergency medicine physician at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center. A flash-bang can hit around 175 decibels when it is detonated, she says. For comparison, a jet engine is about 140 decibels.

The closer you are to the detonation, the more dangerous it becomes. The sudden noise causes temporary deafness, ear ringing, and disruption of the inner ear fluid, which can cause loss of balance, Dr. Larrimore explains. If a person is in a crowd, this is unlikely to cause any permanent damage. However if the person is near it when it detonates, the noise could be enough to cause permanent hearing loss.

The devices can also cause eye pain due to the flashes of bright light that happen on impact, according to a report from the Institute for Defense Analyses (IDA). That light has the potential to harm the tissue of your retina (the light-sensitive tissue lining the back of your eyes), the report found.

Flash blindness can also occur, a reversible change in the state of the eye due to a sudden increase in light. During this temporary state of blindness, virtually nothing is visible except a positive or negative afterimage, the IDA report states.

There is a disproportionately high risk of injuryand even deathdue to debris generated from a flash-bang, especially within a close range, according to Physicians for Human Rights (PHR). Flash-bangs are not like traditional grenadesthey do not spray shrapnel when the pin is pulled, Dr. Larrimore says. There is no explosive in the device and the container is not designed to fragment. However, they do go off with enough force that if there are rocks or other debris nearby, that theoretically can be propelled into the air and hit bystanders causing puncture wounds to the skin, eyes, and chest.

PHR specifically breaks down what can happen after a flash-bang attack into four different injury types:

According to a 2015 ProPublica report, at least 50 people in the United States have been seriously injured, maimed, or killed by flash-bangs since 2000.

Physicians for Human Rights opposes the use of flash-bangs, noting in an online statement that they have no place in effective crowd management.

The best way to avoid injury from a flash-bang is doing your best to avoid them entirely, Dr. Larrimore says. If you are protesting or happen to be near a protest, she recommends being aware of the people around you. If the crowd becomes agitated or violent, try to leave the scene before police use crowd control measures.

While you could consider ear protection, this is likely not safe to use in a large crowd where it is important to be able to see and hear what is going on around you for your own safety, she says. If you are injured by [a flash-bang], it is important to seek medical care.

Support from readers like you helps us do our best work. Go here to subscribe to Prevention and get 12 FREE gifts. And sign up for our FREE newsletter here for daily health, nutrition, and fitness advice.

This content is created and maintained by a third party, and imported onto this page to help users provide their email addresses. You may be able to find more information about this and similar content at piano.io

This commenting section is created and maintained by a third party, and imported onto this page. You may be able to find more information on their web site.

Read the original:
What Is a Flash-Bang Grenade? Heres How They Work and Why Theyre Dangerous - Prevention.com

This entry was posted on June 4, 2020 at 10:50 am and is filed under Blindness. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed. |