USA — Army directs global inspection of armor plates

PENTAGON — The Army recent­ly issued a mes­sage for all troops and units to inspect their body armor, specif­i­cal­ly the Enhanced Small Arms Pro­tec­tive Inserts, or ESAPI, in search of a spe­cif­ic mod­el that was not made accord­ing to con­tract require­ments.

Hel­mets and body armor belong­ing to Sol­diers of the 100th Brigade Sup­port Bat­tal­ion from Fort Sill, Okla., are lined up pri­or to depar­ture at the pas­sen­ger ter­mi­nal at Joint Base Bal­ad, Iraq. Pho­to Cred­it: Sgt. Alex Sny­der. Click to enlarge

To iden­ti­fy if your ESAPI plate needs to be replaced, look for the con­tract num­ber and design code on the back of the plate. Pho­to Cred­it: US Army. Click to enlarge

Every ESAPI plate that needs to be replaced will have the con­tract num­ber SPM1C1-08-D-1023, and one of two design codes: DD3V2 or MP2. Pho­to Cred­it: US Army. Click to enlarge

For­tu­nate­ly, the recalled plates have passed all bal­lis­tic tests so Sol­diers who may have been using the plates were always prop­er­ly pro­tect­ed. How­ev­er, in order to receive replace­ment plates under the war­ran­ty, all the recalled plates must be turned in. 

The non­con­form­ing plates were pro­duced by Armor Works, who have pro­vid­ed 150,000 ESAPI plates, about 10 per­cent of the Depart­ment of Defense’s total sup­ply. Of these 150,000, about nine per­cent (13,500) were not made accord­ing to specification. 

How to iden­ti­fy a recalled ESAPI plate

ESAPI plates that should be turned in to the Cen­tral Issue Facil­i­ty for replace­ment will dis­play the con­tract num­ber SPM1C1-08-D-1023 along with one of two design codes — DD3V2 or MP2. 

The con­tract num­ber and design code are both locat­ed on the data tag on the back of the plate. The con­tract num­ber is in the upper right cor­ner of the data tag, and the design code is the last three to five char­ac­ters of the DOM/LOT number. 

Source:
U.S. Depart­ment of Defense
Office of the Assis­tant Sec­re­tary of Defense (Pub­lic Affairs)