Blackhawk Warrior Wear combat uniforms feature integrated tourniquets

We've seen some incredibly high-tech approaches to better-equipping our soldiers in the battlefield, but Blackhawk Products Group is trying to save lives with a more back-to-basics approach -- by integrating tourniquets directly into their Warrior Wear line of battlefield clothing. According to the company, most preventable combat deaths occur due to blood loss from arm and leg wounds, and Blackhawk's system should make it easy to locate and apply a tourniquet in a short amount of time. Blackhawk is planning on licensing the tech to other military suppliers, so hopefully we'll be seeing the system pop up for all our troops soon.

[Will @ Sep 7th 2007 10:41AM]

Soldier 1: Hey I'm almost done with the tourniquet on your arm!
Soldier 2: Its my leg thats messed up, my arm is fine!
Soldier 1: Hold on, I'll get your leg in a sec, let me just finish your arm.

[BrettB @ Sep 7th 2007 10:50AM]

Poor taste.

[Le Master @ Sep 8th 2007 10:39AM]

Am I missing a subtle pun or is it really just that lame?

[Will @ Sep 8th 2007 9:49PM]

Has anyone ever been in the military before. I've seen soldiers do "hey lets play football with the m9" or "Hey stick me with that IV, it'll be fun" or dozens of other silly games. I wouldn't be surprised to see some soldier lost his leg because....
yeah, sorry it was lame!

[MeNotYou @ Sep 7th 2007 10:45AM]

Heorin addicts should flock to these like ghetto kids at a flea market.

[fred @ Sep 7th 2007 10:48AM]

Hey, this is an amazing idea. We need more of this kind of thinking in design. It seems so obvious!

Heroin addicts shoot up in their legs?

[Alan Partridge @ Sep 7th 2007 11:00AM]

Heroin addicts do the darndest things

[Korsakow @ Sep 7th 2007 11:41AM]

@fred:

"A sample of 200 injecting drug users were interviewed about their bodily injection sites.(...) Almost all (99%) had injected in the cubital fossa (crook of the arm). The next most popular site was the forearm (71%). Other sites included the hand (53%), foot (19%), leg (18%), neck (10%) and groin (6%)."

Physical injecting sites among injecting drug users in Sydney, Australia (Drug Alcohol Depend. 2001 Mar 1;62(1):77-82)

[fred @ Sep 7th 2007 12:05PM]

Is it ok if I shudder now? I hate needles as it it why would anybody shoot up in their junkital area. Oof!

[cmc07 @ Sep 7th 2007 10:59AM]

They should combine these with the drum pants, they would sell like hotcakes.

[John @ Sep 7th 2007 11:37AM]

I would focus more on preventing those injuries that cause the high blood loss. I'd rather be down a limb than dead, but I'd rather be alive and intact than sans a limb.

[BoneJob @ Sep 7th 2007 11:52AM]

Eh, I'll take their integrated halo-like force field pants instead. But thank you!

[Ari B. @ Sep 7th 2007 12:10PM]

As an EMT, I think that's really clever.

[chadow @ Sep 7th 2007 1:28PM]

As an EMT, I think its clever as well....but its needs another just above the knee. Either that, or the straps need to be able to pull out and be placed where most effective instead of just those 2 locations. If I blew my leg off just below the knee, I wouldn't be so keen on losing the rest almost to my hip.

[Othello @ Sep 7th 2007 2:40PM]

You can just pull the pant leg up...

[i @ Sep 7th 2007 3:14PM]

I would assume that detachment of the leg below the knee implies detachment of the pants covering said part of the leg as well--rendering pulling them up a difficult, if not futile endeavor.

[John Cavanagh @ Sep 7th 2007 5:35PM]

Fantastic idea, however...when can civilians like ME order a pair? Daddy needs not one, but several new pairs of pants.

[Ian Wendt @ Sep 7th 2007 7:57PM]

First of all, using a tourniquet on a limb does not automatically mean you'll lose the limb. As EMTs some of y'all should know that.
Secondly, the placement of the lower leg tourniquet is rather stupid since the artery runs between the bones. You can't compress it with a torniquet there.

[Ench-man @ Sep 8th 2007 1:30AM]

I'm sure this idea will save lives, but how good is it for moral? Nothing says "Hey, your about to get your @#$! shot off!" like a guy handing you a set of clothes with built in tourniquets.