New Video Footage Released of Anti Terrorist Vehicle Crash Testing. To view click here J&S Franklin, suppliers of DefenCell, a rapidly deployable temporary vehicle barrier and blast wall, have released dramatic new video footage of the successful completion of the US Department of State K12 anti ram certification testing in California. In the video you will see a 15,000lb truck being stopped at 50mph with no loadbed penetration! The recent atrocity in Islamabad where more than 50 people were killed and 200 injured, has high-lighted the ease in which terrorists can breach public building security simply by having direct vehicular access to such buildings. Truck bombs in particular have key benefits to the terrorist; the larger load capacity means they are able to use less sophisticated explosives, like the infamous fertiliser bomb, the key component of which is cheap, readily available and less traceable than other explosives. In this instance, the explosion left a crater 30 feet deep in front of the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad, Pakistan. So the challenge for the security officer is to allow as much free movement of people and vehicles as possible but be able to respond to raised threat or risk levels quickly and effectively. To do this it is necessary to have a variety of flexible tools available to respond to the different threat levels. One such tool is a product called DefenCell, a rapid deployment temporary vehicle barrier and blast wall designed by UK companies, J & S Franklin and Terram, made in UK and USA, and supplied by Franklin. DefenCell is made of a geotextile material which when stored lays flat but when deployed opens out into a cellular or honeycomb shape, which gives it strength and structural integrity. Each cellular section is then filled with locally available aggregate type material, including sand, ballast or earth. The barrier can be installed on tarmac, concrete or other surfaces, fits over kerbs and round street furniture, and requires no digging or foundations Additional layers of cells can be placed on top of one another and filled to create a barrier or wall to the required height and length. The K12 wall shown would provide a substantial vehicle barrier, would act as a blast mitigation wall if the vehicle was detonated, absorbing large amounts of shrapnel, as well as providing sufficient protection to stop a second attacking vehicle if necessary. In Afghanistan the British Army have used the system to create 1000m of walls or berms 4m high to protect vulnerable ammunition dumps. DefenCell, which was recently installed at an airport in the UK, can be used as a vehicle barrier on the key approaches to a building to slow and control traffic or directly outside a building as a vehicle and blast mitigation barrier. It is ideal for rapid deployment during time of raised threat levels or for more medium term use when threat levels are uncertain but do not warrant more permanent barriers. In this case DefenCell can be 'landscaped' and made to look less obvious by the planting of flowers and shrubs etc, while still retaining its protective capabilities. The deployment process is quick and simple and requires minimal training. A small team using a small digger can do it in a matter of minutes - a 5m long barrier, 1.5m high can be deployed in less than half an hour, but if necessary it can even be carried and deployed by a lone individual using nothing more than a shovel and a wheel-barrow. A similar size wall would take over 900 sandbags. Once threat levels have again reduced the barriers and walls can be quickly removed and the aggregate or ballast re-used. It terms of storage, a room with a floor space of only 10sqm with DefenCell stacked up to 2m high could hold enough DefenCell to build a wall 1.5m high and 1.35m wide and 500m long. It also provides a number of significant logistical advantages over other comparable systems being up to 5 times less weight and transport volume, man portable as well as air-droppable. DefenCell is non metallic, with no cages or hinges, so there is no risk of secondary shrapnel or communications interference. Jeremy Milton of distributors J&S Franklin said, "DefenCell is ideal for the protection of public buildings because it combines strength and stopping power with simplicity, versatility, ease and speed of deployment and a very low logistic footprint. The same system can be deployed in a wide variety of roles including flood barriers, force protection, construction and can be filled with locally available materials such as sand or earth". DefenCell has undergone rigorous crash and blast testing and is compliant to US Department of State K12 anti-ram certification, where it stopped a 15,000lb truck at 50mph with no loadbed penetration. It also successfully completed vehicle crash tests by the UK's Transport Research Laboratory, stopping a 7.5-ton truck as well as blast mitigation and ballistic tests with Advantica and HP White. Other customers include the UK MoD in Afghanistan, the Irish Defence Forces in Chad, Canadian Armed Forces and the US DoD.

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