Reinforced concrete (RC) is commonly used in defence and protective structures such as shelters and barriers. Such protective structures may be subjected to dynamic loads from explosions from conventional weapons. Protective structures are designed for a ductile response, thereby preventing shear-type failures. The results of this paper are based on experiments conducted on 27 reinforced concrete beams, where 18 were tested dynamically and 9 were tested statically at KTH Royal Institute of Technology. A mass was dropped onto the beams in the dynamic tests, while an MTS machine was used to perform the static tests. The load position was varied at different distances from one of the supports. The beams were designed with both compression and tensile reinforcement and three different configurations of shear reinforcement: no stirrups and stirrups with 90 mm and 45 mm spacing, respectively. The tests were instrumented with load cells and accelerometers. The recorded data were analyzed, focusing on three main factors: the effect of load position, shear reinforcement configuration, and dynamic versus static loading effects. The results indicated that compression strut failures occurred when the load was positioned closest to the support, while the failure mode transitioned to flexural shear with the load further from the support. Beams without shear reinforcement exhibited inclined cracks, with a significant shear influence and less contribution from bending. In contrast, beams with higher shear reinforcement content predominantly developed bending cracks with a diminished influence from shear.