From the decree of the Ministry of Interior of 26th August 2014 on the storage, carrying and registration of weapons and ammunition, it follows that it is permissible to store weapons in a safe of class S1 (according to the PN-EN 14450 standard). This is what the regulations say. However, if we really want to maintain full safety, is a class S1 safe sufficient?
The introduction of new regulations in the form of the ordinance of the Ministry of the Interior of 26th August 2014 on the storage, carrying and record-keeping of weapons and ammunition has caused some confusion on the market of armoured cabinets and safes. According to this regulation, weapons can be stored in devices that meet the requirements of at least class S1 according to the PN-EN 14450 standard. So what about people who already have gun cabinets? They simply have to adapt to the existing regulations, for which they have 5 years.
Fine, but what about the cabinets, which were manufactured much earlier and are much more solid than a class S1 cabinet, but do not have a rating plate confirming compliance with the PN-EN 14450 standard? In such a situation the only thing that saves the user from the necessity of buying a new gun cabinet is to obtain a certificate confirming that the owned cabinet for handgun or long gun meets the requirements of the S1 standard. Of course, such an opinion can only be issued by an authorised unit certifying specific products, services and processes.
The PN-EN 14450 standard of the Polish Committee for Standardisation for safes is the lowest of the existing standards. In practice it defines the resistance of the device to attacks in SU/TP points (in the case of S1 it is enough to obtain 2 SU) and describes the lock with which the cabinet should be equipped (in the case of this standard it is one lock according to EN 1300). The standard does not describe the thickness of the enclosure walls, its weight or how it should be anchored (only the minimum mechanical strength per anchor hole of 20 kN). In practice, therefore, it is not uncommon for gun cabinets meeting the S1 standard to be cabinets with a weight of 25 kg and a steel wall thickness of 2-3 millimetres. Can this really be considered sufficient security?
What if you have a class 0 weapon cabinet? Is it necessary to replace it with, after all, a weaker quality S1 or S2 class cabinet? Fortunately not. From the opinion of the Institute of Precision Mechanics sent by the Police Headquarters to Hartmann Tresore (ref. ES-2080/2047/15) it follows that class "0" cabinets according to PN-EN 1143-1 have a higher burglary resistance class than PN-EN 14450 cabinets. And if this is the case, then all cabinets classified according to PN-EN 1143-1 meet the requirements of the regulation.
So if you are buying a gun cabinet, then - although at the moment the regulations only require you to meet the S1 standard – it is worth considering buying a class S2, '0' or higher gun cabinet. There are three reasons for this. The first is the safety of yourself and your household members. The second reason is connected with storing in the safe, apart from weapons, household valuables, collections, e.g. numismatic items or valuable documents. The last reason is the need to secure oneself for the future from having to buy a gun cabinet again as a result of another change in the regulation. It is more than certain that changes in the scope of tightening the regulations and increasing the safety level of storing weapons (especially long hunting weapons) will take place. We have already observed such a situation in Germany.
We address the issue of storing weapons with ammunition at home here: Why must you always keep your weapons in a safe?
Check: HARTMANN TRESORE gun cabinets
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