Nail lock

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Metal mesh nail strips for the United States Army (2009)

A spike strip , and nail strip , nail strips , nail chain or Nagelgurt and colloquially tire killer called, is a means by which the rubber tires can be destroyed vehicles in continuous pass. The police use nail locks, among other things, to stop wrong-way drivers or to end a car chase . In addition, there are nail strips that are permanently built into the street.

Vehicle tires can also be damaged by self-made nail boards or individual crow's feet . Crow's feet were the forerunners of modern nail locks.

variants

Older models

Older nail strap in the Zurich City Police Museum

Conventional nail lock models often consist of a metal mesh or chain with nails or larger metal spikes attached to it pointing upwards. The nails are hollow and have holes in them so air can quickly escape from the tire even if they get stuck in it. The rapid escape of air, however, carries the risk of the getaway car going out of control or even overturning. Therefore, such nail locks are not up to date.

Stop sticks

Newer nail barriers, so-called stop sticks (spelling also stop sticks ), are one meter long three-sided plastic rods. Inside, 36 pointed tubes protrude in all three directions. If the stop sticks are thrown on the street, a row of nails always points upwards. Three meters of a road can be cordoned off with three connected bars. From a weight of 400 kilograms, the triangular plastic rod is compressed and the nail lock with hollow tubes contained in it can penetrate the tire. In contrast to conventional nail chains, the air escapes very slowly, so that the risk of accidents is reduced. A fleeing car driver may be able to drive several kilometers after driving over stop sticks.

Permanently installed, one-way passable nail lock

Permanently installed nail strips

Permanently installed nail strips are attached to the street in sinks or thresholds. These locks can be extended if necessary.

Other fixed barriers are built into the road at an angle and can be moved. If you drive over this barrier from the right side, the nails fold away downwards. Driving on from the wrong side, the nails remain up so that they only block the road in this direction.

Nail boards

In this context, a nail board is usually a simple wooden board that is punched through with nails and secretly laid out by a perpetrator or buried in the ground in order to damage the tires of drivers or cyclists. Such nail boards have been found, for example, in parking lots and forest paths, but also on motorways and motorways. Sometimes it is not clear whether the perpetrator wanted to destroy tires or injure pedestrians. Often it is a dangerous intrusion into road traffic .

On the other hand, in some newspaper reports the nail barriers used by the police are imprecisely referred to as “nail boards”.

Web links

Commons : Nail locks (portable)  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files
Commons : Nail locks (permanently mounted)  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. A57 near Dormagen: Police stop wrong-way drivers after 40 kilometers with nail lock rp-online.de, October 10, 2016.
  2. Wild chase: police stop Mercedes with nail lock pnp.de, November 22, 2015
  3. See video on YouTube (0:31 min). After driving over a nail lock, the vehicle throws into other vehicles on the opposite lane.
  4. ^ A b Eckard Gehm: America as a model for the police in Schleswig-Holstein. In: shz.de. November 5, 2013, accessed November 26, 2013 .
  5. a b Use of a nail lock polizistmensch.de, 11 August 2017.
  6. At the staff parking lot: nail boards placed under tires wochenblatt.de, April 19, 2015.
  7. a b Gröbenzell: Radlhasser hides nail board in puddle Abendzeitung-muenchen.de, April 15, 2016.
  8. a b nail board laid out on the B 4 az-online.de, October 2, 2012.
  9. Dangerous nail boards on the A3 - how do you react correctly to a sudden flat tire? aargauerzeitung.ch, April 8, 2019.
  10. a b Rommerskirchen: Unknown people hide nail boards in the forest rp-online.de, January 3, 2017.
  11. Police stop confused wrong-way drivers with nail board waz.de, October 22, 2012.
  12. After 40 kilometers: 84-year-old wrong-way driver stops the nail board spiegel.de, October 9, 2016.