Merged bullets or what are the odds?
- Thread starter leadcounsel
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I do not know about today, but if you where shooting cannons, I could see it having a higher chance of hitting. It would be almost impossible to have a .22 hit a 308 you would have to have the guns pointing at each other and the speed rates/drop. The only thing I ever heard about was on the history channel, US sniper shoots enemey sniper score out and kills with head shot.
leadcounsel
member
Highly unlikely in modern conflicts, one would think, when there are no longer lines of thousands of men firing at close range against thousand of men returning fire. However, still seems so improbable as to be nearly impossible. Yet it happened often enough for evidence of it to be found.
Monkeyleg
Member.
Not unique enough to change a range officer's mind. Another shooter and I were shooting at different backstops such that our lines of fire crossed. The RO demanded we switch places.
Double Naught Spy
Sus Venator
I think that is the 3rd one I have seen. I know it is at least the 2nd. All were Civil War.
While unlikely and while certainly not done intentionally, it should be nothing of a surprise. Look at all the times people shooting at one another hit each other (one or the other) in the firearm due to a sighting fixation or chance.
Let's see, with 172,000 men fighting each other at Gettysburg, even if you take out a goodly number for support, that is still a lot of shooting at one another (75,000 and 97,000).
While unlikely and while certainly not done intentionally, it should be nothing of a surprise. Look at all the times people shooting at one another hit each other (one or the other) in the firearm due to a sighting fixation or chance.
Let's see, with 172,000 men fighting each other at Gettysburg, even if you take out a goodly number for support, that is still a lot of shooting at one another (75,000 and 97,000).
parsimonious_instead
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Stuff like this fascinates me. Another interesting battlefield recovery are muzzleloaders with second and third loads because the person operating the weapon didn't realize it hadn't discharged. I think the record number of charges found is 23.
Granted it was with a toy gun, but I saw something extraodinary once - I used to love those "Jet Disc" guns, and how the discs would bounce around a room as I fired them.
One day I was shooting one, and saw one disc bounce between two hard surfaces, and then landed at a dead, immediate stop in a comparator. A comparator is a small optic the size of a film canister - similar to a jeweler's loupe, but a bit larger and has a non-refractive flat objective with graduated measurements at the bottom. And it didn't float into the tiny gap between the upper convex surface of the rim of the piece, it shot into it at a super-acute angle and stopped suddenly. The effect was not unlike when you throw a tennis ball into a well-anchored chain-link fence - it can get stuck in one of the "pockets" but stops with such suddenness that it looks a bit strange...
Granted it was with a toy gun, but I saw something extraodinary once - I used to love those "Jet Disc" guns, and how the discs would bounce around a room as I fired them.
One day I was shooting one, and saw one disc bounce between two hard surfaces, and then landed at a dead, immediate stop in a comparator. A comparator is a small optic the size of a film canister - similar to a jeweler's loupe, but a bit larger and has a non-refractive flat objective with graduated measurements at the bottom. And it didn't float into the tiny gap between the upper convex surface of the rim of the piece, it shot into it at a super-acute angle and stopped suddenly. The effect was not unlike when you throw a tennis ball into a well-anchored chain-link fence - it can get stuck in one of the "pockets" but stops with such suddenness that it looks a bit strange...
06
Member
Was at Petersburg several yrs ago and saw some on exhibit. Awesome thought that two men were shooting at each other and both lived because they were good shots.
CajunBass
Member
Not as rare as you might think. I saw several back in my relic hunting days. And it has nothing to do with two men shooting at "each other." It's simply a matter of thousands of bullets in the air at the same time. Sooner or later, two of them are going to try to occupy the same space at the same time.
I would expect it to happen more often in modern warfare if for no other reason than automatic weapons put more lead in the air than single shots did. I suspect we don't see evidence of it simply because (1) no one looks for it and (2) the rounds being smaller, lighter, and faster they tend to destroy each other more often.
robert garner
Member
WW1
Had it's oddities also.
The Brits came up with a sniper rifle with a second stock and periscope sight system so Tommy could aquire a target and not take a thump to the grape.
Apparently Hans and Tommy picked each other out and fired almost simultaneously, the 8mm met the 303 still in its barrel !Tommy remarked "it gave a great shiver and came apart in my hands"
The rifle was in the Pattern Room,before the powers that be in the UK, shut it down.
robert
Had it's oddities also.
The Brits came up with a sniper rifle with a second stock and periscope sight system so Tommy could aquire a target and not take a thump to the grape.
Apparently Hans and Tommy picked each other out and fired almost simultaneously, the 8mm met the 303 still in its barrel !Tommy remarked "it gave a great shiver and came apart in my hands"
The rifle was in the Pattern Room,before the powers that be in the UK, shut it down.
robert
lucky-gunner
Member
That would be something worth seeing. Too bad it's not available to view.
Steven@LG
Hillbillyz
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I've read first hand accounts where soldiers said it sounded like lightening struck in the air near them, when two bullets collided together.
Hunterdad
Member
They did this on Mythbusters with musket balls. They got them to fuze together.
phoglund
Member
I also remember the Petersburg, VA exhibit when I lived in that town in the mid-70's. I was back there last week to look again but didn't arrive at the battlefield visitor center until after it closed. I'd watched that Mythbusters episode a while back and found myself yelling at the screen for the presenters to just go down to Petersburg and check out the exhibited evidence! Their reaction when they were able to duplicate the fusing was fun to behold...although they did end up calling the possibility of it happening 'plausible' but unlikely.
Paul
Paul
I've seen it with .30-06 rounds from WWI.
There is an exhibit somewhere in the Patton museum at Ft. Knox with an example of two that an officer had found on a WWI battlefield, nicely fused together. I saw this so long ago I cannot recall the battle, but it was a 1918 battle with US forces involved. The exhibit was there in the '70s but I have not been back in many years to see if it's still out or has been archived.
There is an exhibit somewhere in the Patton museum at Ft. Knox with an example of two that an officer had found on a WWI battlefield, nicely fused together. I saw this so long ago I cannot recall the battle, but it was a 1918 battle with US forces involved. The exhibit was there in the '70s but I have not been back in many years to see if it's still out or has been archived.
leadcounsel
member
Wow, what exactly does lightning sound like?
Tim the student
Member
Thunder?
highorder
Member
There's a high speed bullet video (linked here before) that shows buckshot hitting a bullet in flight from a perpendicular angle. Now that's timing.
2:00 mark, here.
2:00 mark, here.
Wolfeye
Member
I was at a paintball game once about 12 years ago where two paintballs collided in midair. Nobody there had heard of it happening before, but it seems like it would be inevitable, given that the ammo is very large and the typical player shoots hundreds of times in about 15 minutes.
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