The currently referenced standard for riot helmets in the United States is the National Institute of Justice Technology Assessment Program’s “Riot Helmets and Face Shields; NIJ Standard-0104.02.” This standard was introduced in 1980 and last revised in 1984. Most headgear standards undergo revision by committee on a minimum five year basis. This keeps them up to date, reflecting modern materials and technologies, as well as adapting to the changing needs of the headgear user and to address what injuries are sustained in the field. Most importantly for a safety standard, it allows pass/fail conditions to stay current with head injury research and human injury tolerance.

Crowd management tactics have changed in the last twenty years, as have the threats facing both police and corrections officers, so it is imperative that the test standard be modernized to reflect those threats. Ever changing tactical gear, officer formations, deployment strategies and confrontational threats will dictate what performance is expected from the helmet. Should a riot helmet continue to be designed for one big hit, like a crash helmet, or multiple hits, like a football helmet? Even a minor head injury that incapacitates an officer could introduce them to further assault in a hostile environment. Much consideration must be given to the emerging science of concussion biomechanics as well as more severe forms of head injury.

The research program will entail background research into the modern threats to crowd control personnel, quantifying the mass, velocity and impact energy of those threats, reconciling user injury data with modern injury tolerance biomechanics, preparing relevant laboratory test methods and proposing realistic new performance limits.

The research activities are expected to be completed by March 2008.