Safety Aspects of the Rubber-Bursting CS Grenade

Abstract

Sheep were used to assess the likelihood of injury from the slow-burning pellets which are explosively scattered from the rubber-bursting CS grenade. Compared with the numbers of pellets scattered, there was a very low incidence of minor damage to the eye. The total number of burns on the body was small, and most were scorches of wool with little actual damage to the skin. Sequential sacrifice of sheep after exposure revealed only slight congestion of nasal and tracheobronchial mucosa of twenty-four hours' duration. The results suggest that, in comparison with the total number of pellets scattered, the possibility of serious trauma resulting from the use of the grenade to disperse aggresive mobs is remote.