UNIVERSITY OF CAPE COAST

COLLEGE OF AGRICULTURE AND NATURAL SCIENCES

DEPARTMENT OF FORENSIC SCIENCE

FORENSIC PHYSICS

MAXWELL ABEDI

ASAMOAH CLEMNT (Bs/Fsc/21/0006)

Questions

1a. Discuss what you learnt in the forensic physics class.

1b. Provide limitations you encountered in the course and suggest areas for future direction.
Forensic physics is basically the application of physics principles and methodologies to
investigate and understand the mechanism of accidents and or failures and to reconstruct such
incidents. The course was composed of three main parts, forensic engineering, forensic
ballistics and structural failure. The motive behind the course was to equip students with the
appropriate skills, knowledge and discipline to aid them in reconstruction of accident scenes,
be it vehicular, structural or shooting, so as to identify and establish what events may have
led to the accidents occurrence.

In the forensic engineering, there were discussions on vehicular accidents. This is where the
forensic physics pyramid was applied to assist in investigations and reconstruction of
vehicular accident scene. It entailed the gathering of physical evidence and facts from the
scene, analysis of the collected evidence using suitable methods and principles (like Energy
and Momentum) based on the facts and drawing conclusions from the analysis made. The
main function the forensic physicist is to protect life and property. During investigations, he’s
to assess what was present before the incident, the condition it was in and what condition it is
in after the incident. Based on this observation, plausible hypothesis are made to link the pre
event conditions to the post event conditions afterwards ,there’s the gathering of evidence
which will either support or refute your hypothesis and finally the reconstruction of the scene
know as reverse engineering.
We also learnt about factors that may lead to a vehicular accident, where discussions on
component failures like; Braking system failure , steering system failure , ignition system
failure , fatigue type and tensile type fracture and under inflated tires, human error and
environmental conditions and exactly how they lead to vehicular accidents.

Following, was forensic ballistics where we talked about fire arms and ammunition. It
consisted of internal, external and impact ballistics. Discussions on the effect propellant
charge has on the velocity, range and trajectory of a projectile, the effects of jump, recoil, and
vibration of the fire arm as well as ricochet and its effect. Muzzle velocity, gravitational pull,
angle of fire, air resistance, constructional features of firearm and ammunition ( like rifling
which creates spin and drift) and some environmental conditions have effect on the trajectory
of a projectile. Projectiles with higher velocities tend to have a more flatter trajectory other
than a parabolic shaped trajectory. We learnt the importance of gunshot residue, the
determination of the range and direction of travel of a projectile (using laser or trajectory
rod), velocity of projectiles, the angle at which they are fired, the presence of cartridge cases
and more, in the reconstruction of gunshot scenes. We also talked about gunshot headaches,
keyhole wounds, bullet resistance body amour, density of loading, stopping power of
projectiles, base drag etc and their implications in forensic ballistics.

The last discussion was on structural failure. Over the years, humans have improved their
architectural skills in building or construction of structures for different purposes through the
process of trial and error. By learning from their mistakes when a particular structure fails,
they’ve been able to construct more robust and reliable structures. Here we learnt about
human and physical errors which (may) lead to a structural failure and the need to device
suitable suitable strategies to escape these errors and therefore abolishing the trial and error
tactic to adopt a trial and success tactic. This would help to reduce or if possible eliminate the
lose of life and properties as a result of structural failure. Here forensic scientists try to
identify and explain what may have led to the failure. They are able to do this through
observations and analyzing the structure to know the components which led to the failure.
The need for constructors to include unforeseen circumstances in their strategies to construct
more robust structures to resist forces we cannot fully comprehend and analyze (margin of
safety).

The course was interesting and had its own way of explaining things using scientific
principles and methodologies which helped students to gain understanding on how certain
things happen and what and how to identify relevant information to aid in reconstruction of
scenes. However, there were some challenges students faced in the course which made us not
to enjoy it to the fullest, to say the least.

There wasn’t enough learning materials, though we were provided with slides and some book
recommendations, it wasn’t enough for us to fully understand or appreciate the course. The
slides provided wasn’t detailed enough and wasn’t clear, this made it quite difficult for us to
understand and follow the proceedings during lectures. There wasn’t enough explanations
and calculations to help us appreciate what we were doing more. The books which were
recommended either contradicted the slides, made things more complicated or we had to read
plenty pages before arriving at relevant information..We the student, as a result, had to
dedicate a lot of our time to reading ,which we did not have enough.

The course was somewhat more of application and therefore there was supposed to be
practical sessions to help us understand what we were doing and to appreciate our progress.
There wasn’t any practical session to demonstrate what we learnt and therefore we only read
in an attempt to just pass and get the grades and forget. If there was, we would have been able
to express what we have learnt and see if what we know is actually true, we would be able
sustain more knowledge and acquire the skills to help us in work in the feature, all what we
have are just some theories people have proven by words but cannot apply it practically if the
need be. Just attending lectures to have discussions about the course wasn’t enough to equip
us with the knowledge, experience, understanding and skill the course is intended to grant us.

During the lecture periods for the course, there wasn’t enough detailed explanations, not
enough calculations and explanations to those. Some principles and theories in the course to
be honest, are still a mystery to us. We did not really understand the calculation aspects well
because there wasn’t enough explanations and questions for students to try out. Different
questions required different strategies and principles in solving them but since we weren’t
exposed to this through solving different questions, application of our knowledge about
concepts was lacking. At least a tutorial session to discuss questions and test students
understanding of the course along the line would have been okay, but since there wasn’t any,
we didn’t know how to apply our knowledge or if how we are applying them was the right
way or not. This is part of what led to us failing our quizzes since we had learnt a lot in class
and on our own but wasn’t sure as to how to apply what we have learnt.

As students, we were told to read wide and try our best to go through the books.
recommended by our lecture, we did that and as a result was exposed to a lot of things which
weren’t thought in class, anytime we tried to apply this knowledge in our quizzes, the TA
marks us wrong or not give us the full marks. It was as if if your answer is not in the marking
scheme, whether it makes sense or not you’re not going to get the full marks. Which should
not be so, there are alternate ways to answer questions except for a few. But there isn’t strictly
one way to answer a question or there isn’t always just an answer to some questions therefore
it was important to consider what answered we give and our perspective while marking our
papers especially questions which require explanations.
Although the course was quite interesting and important for our line of study and work and a
lot was thought and learnt, there were some challenges we faced which made us not to be
able to fully appreciate the course. Thank you.