has anyone ever been hit by a bullet ricochet?

Rickshaw

Rickshaw is the cart thing in China right?

Got hit with some bird shot while shooting a copperhead once. Was about 15 feet from the snake and knew it might very well bounce back, but had two kids playing near the water and wanted the snake dead. Put some safety glasses and fired away, it stung for a few seconds, but I fared better than the snake

At an indoor range I was hit in the stomach by a cast .44 mag bullet just above and right of my belt buckle. It hurt like hell, in fact I thought I'd been shot at first. Only my son and I and one other person shooting. The other guy with the .44 was 3 lanes down and it really rattled him. He showed me his target with all shots clustered together. We could never figure what the bullet hit to come back like that. We found another large bullet fragment behind us too. I heard later there was a problem with the backstop at that range.

I heard later there was a problem with the backstop at that range.

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I would let someone that works there know about this, perhaps RSO, or a manager or owner. This could cause a hefty law matter.

ever been told to stay off the wall in a shootout? i shot at an indoor range with a smooth concrete wall perpendicular to the target butts. i found i could place a target center about a foot off the wall and hit the target with ricochets from almost any angle on the range. The bullets traveled 6 inches to a foot along the wall. the same shot worked off the floor. great for shooting under a car.

I was out in the desert with a couple buddies. A favorite shooting game of ours is to get a couple old golf balls. You throw one out down range a bit and each guy trys to hit the thing with his .22

We had been doing this for a couple minutes when I fired, missed the golf ball but hit a rock. The bullet fragmented when it hit the rock, but came back and cut my cheek. I was sure glad I had my glasses on that day.

Splatter, sure. A real ricochet? No.

I got hit in the left hand with a 5.56 ricochet in 03. My squad leader shot a door lock with his M4. I was standing right beside him and took the rear half of the round inbetween my pinky and ring finger on the back of my hand. I was able to pull it out and it left a scar.

One time in an indoor range my buddy had the jacket of a 45acp come back and lodge itself in his shirt. Scared the crap outta him when it hit. Made a thump sound too.

Yes; fragments.

Always
wear
eye protection.

[FWIW slightly off direct subject of thread, sorta]

When I first atarted shooting prairie rats I used a .243 loaded with 75-grain solid based Zipedo bullets. I could not fire that thing at the low angles required for prairie rat shooting without hearing the "pwaaaang" of a ricochet, even if you hit the prairie rat.

Those bullets hung together too well with that solid gilding metal base.

I quit that nonsense right quick and went out and bought a proper .223 varmint rifle and started to use 52-gr "SX" (for "Super Explosive") varmint bullets. The rifle has a 1-14 twist, well suited for those light bullets.

I never, ever, ever, heard a ricochet again and felt very confident about shooting around livestock after that. I have stated that "they break up if they hit a blade of grass."

Over the years I decided that a cartridge which is very prone to ricochet is the .22LR. I guess the bullet is moving too slow to break up much, and they seem to kerpwang all over the place without a nice soft squishy backstop.

[/FWIW slightly off direct subject of thread, sorta]

Years ago with buddies shooting up a bunch of home grown targets in a gravel pit 12 gauge shot started coming back to us hard. Then when I popped a bowling pin at 30 feet with a 357. Hit me right on the ankle bone and I thought I had been hit with a bat.

Sitting there in the dirt yowling did nothing for my self proclaimed John Wayne image at the time. So I picked up my toys and went home.

I was hit in the eyelid with a BB. My friend and I were shooting at army men in the garage and he hit the plastic solder then the bb hit the back of the garage and came back to my eye. It was weird, like slow motion and then it hit me. I had enough time to close my eye so no damage.

Three times in the last 18 months. I'm a bullet magnet.

But, seriously, it is just a smidge freaky to feel a THUMP! against your ribs and look down to find a hot piece of deformed lead sitting in your lap.

Oh, well.

Two lives left. I think I'll save one for next Christmas.

nope,but got shot in the ass with rock salt for beinmg someware we werent supposed to be when we were kids,and with all i have heard i think i would have preferred the ricohet tho,lol

I was shooting my Mosin at my favorite shooting area. Well, I didn't see it, but there was an old bike behind the weeds behind the target I was shooting at, so ignorant me, I took the shot, hear a Whiiizzzz and smack. Hit me in my left calf. It's still there too. Can't afford insurance or whatever, so, I bandaged it up, let it heal, and now I got a nice mushroomed (sorta anyway, slightly deformed) FMJ 7.62x54r bullet stuck in my calf.

...and now I got a nice mushroomed (sorta anyway, slightly deformed) FMJ 7.62x54r bullet stuck in my calf.

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Four thoughts:

(0) What, no infection from the cloth of your pants being embedded in the wound? Were you wearing shorts?

(1) I wonder if it would set off the magnetic detectors at the airport. Bit of 'splainin' to do, eh?

(2) Good thing they weren't using depleted uranium for the bullet cores.

(3) I'd get that puppy removed at the earliest financially possible moment. Usually, even steel-cored bullets have a lead liner between the core and the jacket so the jacket can "take" the rifling.

i shot at an indoor range with a smooth concrete wall perpendicular to the target butts. i found i could place a target center about a foot off the wall and hit the target with ricochets from almost any angle on the range. The bullets traveled 6 inches to a foot along the wall. the same shot worked off the floor.

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So you're that guy.

Unfortunately I log a lot of shooting time every year so I see an ungodly amount of richochets.

Some notable ones:
Had two .22 ricochets go clean thru my T-shirt on each side of me without hitting me
Caught a .308 ricochet in the hand, left a teardrop shaped bruise for a couple weeks and hurt like hell
Had a 7.62x39 go thru the side of my lower leg about 6" above the ankle.
Had a .223 flew thru my armpit and chewed up the inside side of my bicep
Caught a 00 Buck pellet right above the belt
Caught a splattered 12ga slug but my jacket caught most of it

I couldn't begin to count the times I've been pwanged by bullets AND fragments. Only a few broke the skin, but they bled like hell. Between being a range ranger and being addicted to shooting bowling pins inside a metal box (our pin range) I bet I've had well over 100 minor contusions from reflected and deflected ejecta. Shoot 50,000 rounds inside a steel rectangle and that stuff happens a lot.

Outside the pin range Ball ammo and 22's are the most common offenders, and hit the hardest, but jacket fragments always tend to impact my flesh with the pointiest edge leading the way. I've taken several hits from rounds coming out the back of a spinning bowling pin, right back where it came from - me. Luckily the lighting is pretty good, and they aren't going that fast, and I can usually see them coming if they're headed toward my face.

Then there are all the times during qual shoots that I feel bullets thunking into my shins, when other shooters either missed the back of the range, or pinged one off the target holder. Most of those don't even leave a mark, but they're pretty distracting in the middle of a string!

And yes, I'll chant the mantra too..............WEAR THEM GLASSES!

Papajohn

Not a ricochet, but I got smoked from about sixty yards by a stupid old man at MY dove field. He was never invited back.

I got shot in the foot with a .45 ACP bullet from my friend. It was an indoor range and we were being completely safe, it just hit me in the foot. Felt like someone dropped a bullet on my shoe, so it's not like I got hurt or anything.

Yes, hit by an ricochet by an idiot who started shooting .45 fmj at a
steel plate he had set up down a ways from the rifle line I was bench
shooting from. Struck me in the side while I was wearing a heavy coat
and left a welt. The pistol area was suppose to be for stand up framed
card board targets and I couldn't tell what it was until metal started to
clang on metal and I got hit.

I brought this to his attention and he said something like "ok, I'll switch
to hollow points"...

I left before things got out of hand. There's a part of me that still regrets
not bludgeoning him with his steel plate.

I know other people who've gotten bonked in a similar manner including
straight back from their own plates at longer distances. One included a
small nick from a copper jacket and another was a bruise in the middle of
the forehead.

Yes, boys and girls, this is why you wear eye protection.

Kingjoey, let me know which places you shoot so I can avoid them next time
I visit AZ.

You are a frag magnet!

Twice!
Once in the Army, by a .22 LR out of a high-standard target pistol.

The Pvt. E-Nothing I was coaching stuck a magazine in the gun and squeezed one off.
"Click".

Then he turned around and said "Hey Sarge! This dam gun don't work!" racked the slide and loaded it, and pulled the trigger again.

The slug hit the concrete between him and I, came back up and buried itself in my upper thigh muscle.
Felt like getting hit with a baseball bat. Just a numb feeling.
Then it hurt like it was on fire about 30 minutes later.

I had to have it dug out & sewed up at the ER.


Then about four years ago, I had a 250 grain .45 LC bounce back off a railroad tie backstop from about 15 yards.

That one hit my boot heel and tore it off, almost knocked me on my azz, and ruined a good pair of ranch wellington boots.

I now have a new-found respect for the .45 LC's slow heavy bullets!
And have no doubt I would have needed another trip to the ER had it came in a little higher.

rcmodel

You are a frag magnet!

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Yeah, that's sort of the running joke amongst us. If we hear bullets ricocheting everyone snickers and takes a step away from me

Yeah, I bounced a .357 slug off of a target (I was too close, but being new to shooting, I didn't know I was too close). The bullet hit me in the abdomen - softly; I wasn't injured - and it took me a moment to figure out what had happened. I bent down and picked up the bullet and suddenly realized what had happened. That was...sobering.