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Assets Held for Sale and Discontinued Operations - Additional Information (Detail) (USD $) In Thousands, unless otherwise specified	12 Months Ended
	Dec. 31, 2014	Dec. 31, 2013	Dec. 31, 2012
Long Lived Assets Held-for-sale [Line Items]
Gain (Loss) on disposition of assets	$ 2,094us-gaap_GainLossOnDispositionOfAssets1	$ 436us-gaap_GainLossOnDispositionOfAssets1	$ 8,396us-gaap_GainLossOnDispositionOfAssets1
Detector Tube Assets
Long Lived Assets Held-for-sale [Line Items]
Gain (Loss) on disposition of assets	$ 2,200us-gaap_GainLossOnDispositionOfAssets1 / us-gaap_IncomeStatementBalanceSheetAndAdditionalDisclosuresByDisposalGroupsIncludingDiscontinuedOperationsAxis = msa_DetectorTubeAssetsMember

X

- Definition

Amount of gain (loss) on sale or disposal of assets, including but not limited to property plant and equipment, intangible assets and equity in securities of subsidiaries or equity method investee.

+ References

Reference 1: http://www.xbrl.org/2003/role/presentationRef

-Publisher FASB

-Name Accounting Standards Codification

-Topic 360

-SubTopic 10

-Section 45

-Paragraph 5

-URI http://asc.fasb.org/extlink&oid=8077374&loc=d3e2443-110228

+ Details

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- Details

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