Continuing our series on church safety and security, we recently addressed ways to harden the outside of a church building. Now we shift indoors to highlight various ways you can integrate “interior hardening” into your church design to keep people, especially children, safe.
Understanding How Ballistic Film Can Increase Church Safety
One of the more interesting safety products available these days is ballistic film. This material is not bulletproof but puncture resistant. The film is applied to windows and anchored in the window frame. It will resist bigger items that might be used to break glass, such as a block, brick, rock or even an ax.
How is this possible? When a rock is thrown at a window or a glass door that has ballistic film, the glass will shatter. However, the ballistic film holds the shattered glass in place, so it doesn’t fall out. Instead, the glass stays stuck to the film, which is anchored in the window frame. This delays potential intruders for many minutes, and even longer. You can find examples of ballistic film being tested on the Internet, and we have recently helped some churches install it on interior windows in their church buildings.
Should You Consider Bulletproof Windows for Your Church Design?
Some church leaders may want to consider upgrading from ballistic film to acrylic bulletproof windows. This option is available but is rarely implemented.
Bulletproof windows aren’t frequently used for interior church safety due to their expense, and because in order for them to be effective, you must “harden” the rest of the area you’re protecting; whether it’s your children’s spaces, church offices, or other sensitive areas of your church building. Otherwise, an intruder can simply move to the side of your bulletproof window and kick a hole in the drywall next to it, and then gain entrance to that area of your church building.
Hardening Walls in Your Church Design
There is, of course, a solution to this problem. To harden an entire area of your church building, you can invest in wall hardening as well. Wall hardening can involve selecting stronger building materials like concrete block, or installing plywood behind drywall, or even steel plates or similar types of bulletproof barriers behind drywall. This prevents anyone from quickly penetrating an interior wall and gaining access to a secured space.
There are many elements of your church design that must be considered in maximizing church safety. In the next installment of our church safety series, we will discuss how you can lock down doors in sensitive areas of your church building. Meanwhile, see what church design ideas we’re discussing now by checking out our free upcoming i3 webinars.
