As the car bomb incident becomes more prevalent globally, in order to protect people lives and avoid the complete destruction of the suspected vehicle, a promising solution is to use flexible vehicle arresting systems, which generally absorb the kinetic energy of the suspected vehicle using energy absorbers and an arresting net. So the vehicle can be arrested safely. According to the existing literature, theoretical research on vehicle arresting system and process is very little. This research is the first attempt at developing the analytical model for the arresting system and process, and carrying out experimental validation. Based on the model built, dynamic analysis of arresting process was also carried out. Experimental and simulated results indicate the model developed is valid and can accurately predict arresting distance. © the authors.