The U.S. Army Natick Soldier Research, Development, and Engineering Center (NSRDEC) is located in Natick, Massachusetts, and serves as the hot-spot for innovative development in the design of tactical helmets, body armor, and other military gears. There have been massive strides made by the NSRDEC in the last couple of years. The center is currently working on a project to create a balanced tactical helmet that can withstand high-level ballistic threats without causing much fatigue on the wearer.

According to the director of the Soldier Protection and Survivability Directorate at NSRDEC, Richard Green,

“There’s kind of a competition between increased threat and weight. We want to protect against increased threat, while minimizing the weight. That’s our goal.”

And as stated, the centerpiece of the NSRDEC helmet display, the NSRDEC prototype helmet, met the protection versus weight challenge head-on. This tactical helmet has a shell that weighs just about 2.5 pounds and around an estimated 3.5 pounds in its final weight. The NSRDEC prototype provides the same level of ballistic protection as the currently-fielded IHPS.

Weighing less than half of the IHPS, the NSRDEC prototype still offer the same level of protection against bullet rounds. It is also designed to protect wearers against fragmentation as well as bullet rounds like the 9 mm rounds.

According to Green, this tactical helmet can also stop the penetration of “prevalent rifle threat.”

The NSRDEC prototype helmet is designed with the UHMWPE material. This is the same material used in the manufacturing of the IHPS, the ECH and the ACH GEN II. However, there have been some tweaks to the UHMWPE used for this tactical helmet which makes it much stronger than the other helmets.

“It’s stronger, so you need less of it,” Green said.

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