If Princess Diana had been travelling in a bullet-resistant armoured car, chances are that the added protection involved might have resulted in there being more survivors of that fateful Paris crash.
Or if the late rap singer, Tupac Shakur, who was killed in a gangland shooting in Las Vegas, had been driving with a Run-Flat Anti-Terrorist Tyre, he too might have survived.
So says Mr Thomas Gaffney (36), who is president of Gaffco * and the first businessman in the US to open a showroom to display bullet-resistant systems manufactured by his company.
Originally from Ballaghadereen, Co Roscommon, he got into the business quite by accident in 1988. His cousin, Mr Bernard McGarry, owned five cheque-cashing facilities in Mount Vernon, about 25 miles north of New York City. Mr Gaffney, who is a plumber by trade and had some construction experience under his belt, began building the cheque-cashing outlets which have now expanded to 25.
In order to guarantee the security of the vast amounts of money that changes hands in a cheque-cashing store, he built fibreglass bullet-resistant windows for tellers, bullet-resistant drawers and opaque package passers. He branched into other products three years ago.
His first clients were federal government installations, banks, cheque-cashing stations and medical organisations. For example, a chemist who is dispensing large amounts of drugs for prescriptions, may wish to use a transparent package passer that is bullet resistant. In fact, Mr Gaffney points out that nothing is bullet-proof but just bullet resistant. He also manufactures bullet-resistant doors in aluminium, steel and wood.
A year ago last September, Mr Gaffney opened his first Manhattan premises on 829 Avenue of the Americas at 28th street. He and his cousin leased two storeys of a four-storey building for 10 years and divided 1,200 sq ft into the Gaffco showroom. "I did market research which led me to believe that a retail store in Manhattan which showed a combination of products would work. If it won't sell in Manhattan, it won't sell anywhere," he said.
Mr Gaffney said throughput of the store has increased dramatically compared to that achieved in the original shop in Mount Vernon. This is due in part to the close proximity to the United Nations building and because of an eye-catching gold Jaguar positioned in the window. This car has been up-armoured which means it has been totally custom designed with bullet-resistant doors, windows, roof and ballistic panels so that shots won't penetrate the car. To custom-fit a vehicle like this costs between $150,000 and $250,000 (£108,000£180,000).
With an increase in terrorist activity in the US and abroad, Mr Gaffney said Gaffco's business is growing from $2.5 million last year to $5 million this year and he expects it to be $10 million by the end of 1999. This is in line with figures that show spending on private security in the US, including manufacturing and services, was $78.2 billion in 1997 and should reach $103 billion by 2000. In fact, security is the second fastest growing industry in the country, after computers.
"In the US, there was never in-grown terrorism before Oklahoma and the World Trade Center bombings," said Mr Gaffney, "now there is".
At the engineering plant in Mount Vernon where 22 are employed, Gaffco custom-builds specialised systems that use transportation and opaque armours to achieve maximum protection against ballistic, forced entry and explosive threats. Bullet-resistant fibreglass armour is made from woven fibreglass cloth impregnated with polyester resin which distributes the impact over the entire surface and traps the bullet. A bullet can therefore shatter the glass but not penetrate it.
In the showroom, Mr Gaffney demonstrates standard weapon/metal detection equipment but one interesting product is the BOSS chair - a Body Orifice Security Scanner. A prisoner, for example, might try and conceal a small metal object such as razor in a body cavity but the chair can detect it by carrying out a body cavity search. Selling at $4,500, the chair has been installed in prisons, detention centres and jewellery stores.
Still, the bread and butter of the business comes from body-vests for personal protection. Mr Gaffney explained how different body-vests can protect the wearer from different bullet types. There are different protection levels from UL1 to UL8 (an Underwriters Laboratory grading). A UL1 bullet-resistant vest, for example, will stop bullets from a 9 mm handgun travelling at 1,100 feet per second. On a higher scale, a UL8 vest will stop penetration of a bullet from a 7.62 mm rifle or AK 47 machine-gun which travels at 3,000 feet per second.
"The higher the ballistic level you go to, the more money you spend," said Mr Gaffney. He also manufactures a Kevlar-lined briefcase designed to deflect assaults from knives and most handguns, and equipment for scanning mail for postal bombs.
His target for sales are foreign embassies, business people and the music/entertainment industry. Most sales come from the US with growing markets in South America and Asia. His largest order was from India for 2,000 vests worth $225,000. He admits that while he mainly deals with exporters in New York who ship the freight outbound, he doesn't often know where the products are headed. "But when I sell a product, I look for identification. If someone looks suspicious, I'll put him off the purchase," he said. Now he is thinking of setting up a factory to handle the European market and this could conceivably be in Northern Ireland.
And without spending a dime on publicity, his business has already been featured in the New York Times, Fortune magazine, on Fox 5 News, in Blackman magazine and in an Israeli newspaper. * www.gaffco@bullet-proofing.com
