Briefing: The response of glazing to blast loading

Breakage of glazing is the largest source of injury from an explosion in an urban area, whether the explosion is due to military attack, terrorist attack, accidental explosion or a natural disaster such as the meteorite over Cheylabinsk, Russia on 15 February 2013. The reasons for this are the ubiquity of glazing in the modern built environment and its proximity to people, its brittleness and low fracture energy, and the formation of elongated and sharp-edged glass fragments. To minimise the injury hazard it is desirable to be able to assess the response. This briefing note explains the response of glazing and glazing systems to blast waves from an external explosion. By choice of suitable makeup of a glazing system, the hazard level to building occupants from a given level of blast loading can be reduced to acceptable levels.