F1 grenade (Australia)

Munitions worker, c.1942. Possibly taken at St. Mary's

The first of the hand grenades safety incidents occurred at an Australian Defence Industries Shell filling factory in St Marys, NSW on 14 November 1995.[7] The detonation occurred within a grenade testing facility at 8:36AM while 4 employees were dismantling a defective F1 grenade. During the dismantling process the grenade accidentally detonated on a workbench surrounded by 4 employees, all of whom were injured as a result, two of which were critically injured.[7] Despite criciticims regarding employee safety as no employees were behind a blast shield nor wearing body armour, a corinial inquest into the matter was never held.[8]

On 12 September 2007 a defence contractor was seriously injured during an accidental detonation of the F1 hand grenade at the Defence Proof and Experimental Establishment in Greytown, Victoria. [9] This resulted in the injured Defence civilian losing his right hand as well as suffering leg injuries.[10] Immediately following this, the Chief of the Defence Force ordered an immediate pause in the training use of the F1 Grenade as to "determine that the right measures are in place to ensure the safety of our people and the reliability of the grenade” [11] During this time, the defence force procured sufficient stocks of High-Explosive grenades from Australia’s ally, the United States in order to support the continuation of training and use by Australian forces deployed overseas.[9] The grenade was released back into service shortly thereafter on 17 October 2007.[12]

Prior to the ADF's decision to suspend the training and use of the F1 grenade, a "small number" of failures to detonate were reported in 2006.[9] These occurred amongst Australian soldiers deployed in the Middle East and saw the ADF take "rapid steps to confirm the reliability of grenades in service".[9] Following the temporary suspension of the F1 fragmentation grendade from use within the ADF, stocks of American High Explosive hand grenades were procured for use by Australian forces deployed in the Middle East. Following the re-introduction of the F1 grenade back into service in October 2007, no subsequent failures to detonate have been reported.

The F2 blast grenade was developed as an insensitive munition’s variant of the F1 fragmentation grenade following a co-development agreement between Thales-owned Australian Munitions and German company Diehl in 2013.[13] The F2 blast grenade is a 225g blast-variant of the F1 grenade with an increased high-explosive RDX-based fill within a plastic body without a fragmentation mechanism. As a result, the F2 has more predictable blast patterns and increased user safety compared to the F1, chiefly suited to use within confined areas for close-quarter combat.[2] The blast mechanism of the F2 renders the grenade more suitable for Offensive use by infantry soldiers with the desired lethality or wounding effect of the grenade achieved through the high pressure of the explosive compared to the fragmentation matrix of the F1 fragmentation grenade.[3]

The F3 Practice Grenade is a non-fragmenting replica of the F1 used for training purposes

The F3 practice hand grenade is a non-fragmenting replica of the F1 grenade used for training purposes and produces an acoustic and smoke signature to simulate the detonation and functioning of the F1 hand grenade during training by the Australian Defence Force.[2] The grenade itself is near-identical to the F1 in physical characteristics consisting of a high impact aluminium die cast body with a replaceable 0.5g flash composition pyrotechnic fuse. This fuse creates audible output and a distinct visual white smoke cloud visible up to 200m to indicate the simulated functioning of the grenade.[2]

In September 2018, it was announced that Thales Australia and the Chemring Group signed a joint Memorandum of understanding covering cooperation in the "design, development and manufacture of a future range of grenades" [14] This new "Family of Grenade" product range includes fragmentation, offensive, smoke and training products to be designed and manufactured at Thales Australia's Commonwealth defence facilities in Benalla, Victoria and Mulwala, New South Wales.[14] Additionally, the Chemring groups production facility in Lara, Victoria will also be used. This agreement on a future range of grenades will focus on the design and manufacture of a "modular hand grenade product range" [15] allowing a user-selectable detonation mechanism depending on the desired battlefield effect.

This new range of modular grenades would combine the effects of the F1 fragmentation grenade and the F2 blast grenade into a selectable modular grenade with capabilities similar to the German Diehl manufactured DM51 modular hand grenade, which has a removable fragmentation sleeve. While the design and development of this grenade is slated to primarily focus on the current and future military needs of the ADF, the grenade range will also be made available for export customers under the Australian Government Defence Export Strategy.[15] Overall this agreement supports "Australia's key Sovereign Industrial Capability priority for munitions and small arms research, design, development and manufacture".[14]

The primary fragmentation hand grenade of the United States Armed Forces since the 1960s is the Day & Zimmermann manufactured M67 grenade.[16] The M67 is slightly heavier than the F1 hand grenade and has an explosive filling of Composition B, or a mixture of RDX and TNT.[16] The M67 has seen use by U.S forces in the Vietnam War, Operation Urgent Fury, Operation "Just Cause" as well as several American military campaigns in the Middle East. SOURCE. In addition to the U.S military, the M67 is currently used or has been used as an infantry hand grenade in the armed forces of Canadian, Malaysia, Nicaragua, El Salvador, New Zealand, Saudi Arabia, The Philippines and Turkey.[17]

The British Armed Forces use the RUAG Swiss-made HG 85 Fragmentation hand grenade with a localised designation of the L109A1[18] This hand grenade is heavier than the F1 hand grenade and has an explosive filling of TNT as opposed to RDX and has a smaller number of fragments (1800 0.1g balls) compared to the F1's 2400[19]

Germany's defence force, the Bundeswehr currently uses the Diehl Defence's DM51 fragmentation hand grenade. As the standard grenade of the nations military, the DM51 has a unique capability of being both an offensive and defensive grenade.[20] The fragmentation mechanism of a hand-grenade serves a defensive purpose,[3] however the DM51 has a removeable fragmentation jacket which allows the user to change the grenade from defensive to an offensive blast grenade.[20] As a result, the DM51 can undertake the roles of both the F1 fragmentation hand grenade and the F2 blast grenade.

The Singapore Armed Forces's primary fragmentation hand grenade is the SFG87 manufactured by ST Kinetics and is lighter in overall mass to the F1 grenade at 300g with slightly different kill and casualty radiuses (5m & 20m).[21]

The Russian Armed Forces use the RGO hand grenade as their primary defensive fragmentation grenade. The RGO is heavier than the F1 grenade weighting between 520g-530g, though it has a similar kill and casualty radius to the F1 (6m & 20m)[22]