Weird ricochet stories?

[arinvolvo]

I dont have many of my own....Mostly If I am too close to a rock or something, I may get a spray of shattered rock....

BUT, my buddy was shooting his AR 15 at a target about 50 yards away that was attached to a large boulder.

His brother standing next to him go a ricochet that hit him in the side, in front of the kidney area. Not the whole bullet ricocheted, JUST the copper jacket!!! It hit him, cut a hole in his shirt, and left a perfect bloody cut circle in his skin....

weird eh? I was not there for the actual ricochet, but I saw the results....pretty scary.

have you ever heard of this happening? I surely hadnt....Do you have any weird/scary ricochet stories?

 

[Rob96]

I was firing my AK ata a target that was approx. 25yds away. Hit the steel target stand, bullet fractured and a chunk flew back. It hit me in the neck about an inch left of the center of my neck. Took 3 stitches to close it up. My family doctors staff couldn't believe it when I called and said I got hit in the neck by a bullet, and asked what I should do.

 

[Norwegian]

Well not weird , but it is the only one I have .

I was practicing 10m air-pistol on the range and after I took a shot the bullet came back and hit my eyelid just as I closed it .

Got an adrenaline rush out of that...happy my eye was closed

 

[bpisler]

In the 70's my brother was shooting at a old tv with a 22lr when he caught one in the thigh.A few years ago me and a friend were shooting in the desert and he was shooting his .45 had one knock his earmuffs off his head and cut his ear.

 

[LAWDOGKMS]

We were qualifying a new Police Officer on the M-16, using a Marine Corps Rifle Range in Georgia several years ago.

One shooter - one rifle - 2 RSO's

The Rifle range was 300 yards, with 50' long X 10' high X 1" thick steel baffles overhead for the first 50-75 yards.

The baffles, made it impossible to fire upward at more than a 10 degree angle...so you had to shoot horizontal with the ground downrange.

At the end of the 300 yards, was a huge 30' high dirt backstop, with downward angled steel deflectors on the very top.

We were doing slow fire on a 100 yard target, when a call came across the radio that a Marine had been shot on base.

We ceased fire, and responded to the emergency to assist the base police.

If I hadn't seen the ballistics report from the FBI lab, I never would have believed this myself!

A 5.56 round left our range, somehow made it under the baffles, over the 30 foot berm, traveled 1.10 miles over trees and swamp, and struck a young marine, burying itself deep into his calf..
(didn't do much damage, and the round was barely deformed)

I did not believe it came from our range, as I assumed this impossible, but the gun and round were sent to the FBI, and came back as a match..

Go figure..

 

[themic]

saw an episode of the croc hunter where he was in florida tracking down a problem alligator in a canal behind some houses, with the local alligator control guys. 8 foot thing suddenly leaps out of the water and attacks them. someone pulls revolver and shoots the alligator midair in an impressive blaze of speed, and the other animal control guy on his right keels over and falls into the water. bullet ricocheted off the alligator and into dude's stomach. this all happens in the span of about 1 second.

 

[Edward429451]

Me & my dad was shooting some 45 AP reloads some years ago and he sighted in on an old concrete cabin foundation out in the woods, murmuring I wonder if it'll crack it. I was just about to tell him I dont think thats a good idea when he shot it and immediately jumped back, it came back and hit his pant leg but never touched his leg. We found the slug on the ground behind us, totally undeformed in any way but missing some finish.

Another time we was by the side of the road by a bridge, getting set to go walk the river and I spotted an old steel tire rim off the road a little and proceeded to see if my Bulldog 44 special could knock a hole in it. I knew it might not so hit it on an angle just to be safe and sure enough, bang, and a half second later, clank, ricocheted up and hit the steel bridge. I didnt try that no more.l

 

[Intel6]

I shoot lots of steel and have been hit by jackets and stuff but it usually never even draws blood. We shoot local steel pistol matches and had an interesting one a few months ago. We run 5 stages and usually leave the last stage up so people can shoot some after the match is over. We shoot in 50 M pistol bays and behind them is a covered area and some bleachers to sit and watch. Right behind the bleachers is where most people park their cars.

Well I was walking back to the covered area and there was a guy burning up his leftover match rounds on the steel. As I just walked under the overhead cover one of the other people sitting on the bleachers cringes and ducks and then a rearvier mirror on the side of one of the vehicles explodes.

I figure the round went right by me. The guy sitting down felt it go right over his head. The funny thing was the the guy who was doing the shooting was the same guy who owned the truck that got hit.

 

[griz]

I've seen a few bullets bounce back but nobody was really hurt.

The only damage I have seen was to a plastic conatiner that had loaded rounds in. I was firing at a tree and a 44 bullet punched a hole in the plastic, which was about 30 feet behind me. It was one of those jugs that Wal-Mart sells paintballs in. Surprized me to come back and see a hole in the side and an intact bullet in the container.

 

[mete]

22 Rfs do deflect - saw a round go through a woochuck,killing it, but deflecting in it at least 45 degrees to then go through a tire.

 

[SDC]

Got hit by a 230-gr RNL .45 at a bowling-pin match one time that left a bruise about the size of a plum to the right of my belly button; OUCH.

 

[Penman]

At an early IPSC match, a shooter who was behind the firing line, watching the stage felt a tug on the front of his shirt. He couldn't figure out what caused it, and finally found a spent bullet had dropped into his pocket.

 

[DigMe]

I saw some footage on Real TV or some similar show in which a woman was filiming a guy shooting at some roadside junk out in the middle of nowhere. The guy was shooting at an old wheel and one of his bullets struck the rim and visibly bounced off and came back almost right at the camera and hit the lady in the head. That was some crazy footage. I think the lady just ended up with a few stitches and a big scare. Be careful out there!

brad cook

 

[Wil Terry]

A PAL OF MINE WAS SHOOTING ON A PRIVATE RANGE

When he took a 45 230 hardball to the forehead. The bullet ricocheted off, went up through his hat, and completely penetrated a 2x4 built roof above his head and off into the ozone never to be recovered. The bullet compressed the skin to tissue paper thickness against the skull and the "wound" sorta seeped a bit of blood.
My pal said he didn't even get a headache from it.

 

[PaulTX]

Some years ago I saw a forensic program on TV where they did a study of an accident that killed a teenage boy at a range. I don't remember all the details, but a shooting match was going on including an air gun competiton in a building. The boy was working at this air gun building and sitting in a chair. This building was near the end of a pistol range that had some design and maintenance problems in that it didn't keep all the bullets in the range.

A pistol shooter did a double tap and on the second round the barrel was pointed up too much and went through the boards at the end of the range - which were in need of repair. The bullet went into the air gun building and killed the boy. Later they found several bullet holes in the building from the past.

Normally though, the bullets that hit this building kept going at an upward angle through the building and no one got hurt. HOWEVER, this particular bullet was "redirected" by a standard office-type ceiling panel a substantial number of degrees downward and struck the boy's head while he was sitting in the chair. They showed a picture of the tile in the ceiling with a long furrow in it.

Truth is stranger than fiction! Does anyone else remember seeing this program?

 

[David4516]

I've never been hit, but after I'm done shooting and go to round up my brass (I re-load), sometimes I'll find spend bullets mixed in with the brass. Two days ago I found a spent 7.62X54 just a couple feet from where a friend and I were shooting. The funny thing was, it was just the jacket. All the lead was missing from the inside, but the jacket wasn't deformed much...

 

[Edward429451]

So from a couple of the posts I take it that some of you all are shooting jacketed rounds at steel?

Shooting steel with jacketed ammo has always been a big No No.
No matter what, cept maybe full blown combat.

 

[spin180]

PaulTX,

I remember the very show of which you speak. I actually had it recorded and watched it a little less than a year ago. The best I can recall and summarize is this:

It was found that a shooter on the outside range was practicing with a somewhat modified model/clone 1911. The fellow had fired and during the recoil, with the pistol still being directed upward, another round was discharged. I believe they determined that the firing pin stuck or sear failed to disengage or something like that.

The range building and the firing range were adjacent to each other, but the building was down range from the firing lines'. That is to say if you fired down range at this place, you would be shooting at the range building. The actual range had several overhead baffles, which were damaged or spaced improperly or something of that nature, and some rather high berms surrounding it, but the building was actually about a foot or two taller than the berm at the end of the range.

They stated the shooter had ignored one of the range rules that stated no one was to shoot forward of a certain line. Well, he was forward of this line and when his pistol malfunctioned, the misfired slug went between the protective baffles, missing one of the baffles by inches. The round continued on and just barely topped the berm at the end of the range; by inches again.

The .45 round penetrated the metal siding into the building. Once inside the projectile struck the ceiling tiles, those white acoustic type tiles, and ricocheted back down toward the floor. They showed the ceiling tile with what I recall was about a 10"-12" gash cause by the slug. The bullet passed through another interior wall just missing a wall stud and some other obstructions (an electrical wiring harness and some cleaning tools...broom, mop, etc...) and then went on to strike the boy in the head.

This bullet somehow found the path of least resistance, missing 7 or 8 different things that would have most likely stopped it before ever reaching the child. Ballistic testing matched the round to the pistol and quite a bit of computer recostruction determined the exact route of the slug and that the shooter's handgun had indeed discharged a second time during recoil; it was a malfunction and not a second pull of the trigger though.

Very strange and tragic.

 

[PaulTX]

spin180,

I was thinking it was a .45 ACP bullet, but wasn't sure. I think between the two of us the details are there. It's incredible a bullet can be deflected by a relatively soft ceiling tile and still have the energy to continue on like it did.

I'm pretty sure that range was closed down soon after this incident.

 

[mete]

PaulTx, I do remember the program and it was a bizarre incident. However the range was extremely poorly designed and very dangerous. After all the building where the youngster wa s hit was BEHIND the backstop of the range. There were other dangerous parts of the range too.

 

[Gordon]

Back in 80's I had a 'shoot house' an old adobe with 3 foot thick walls. One sunny new years day we had a shoot with MD's in attendance. I had put up 'pepper poppers ' on one end of one room. Every body was using pistols until I cleared the room with my HK 93 with stock collapsed a bit and when I came out I felt a slight sting in my thigh. I had the back end of an 855 5.56 round stuck 1.5" deep. A doc pulled it out and cleaned it , it started hurting(burning) like hell in a few hours . This was the end of steel targets inside the building, we used old dept store manikens after that!:banghead:

 

[Dr.Rob]

I've been hit with a ricochet at an indoor range before, once it was a lead .45 flattened to the size of a quarter, once it was a copper jacket from a big revolver.

Both didn't hit with enough force to break my skin but it DID get my attention. Always wear safety glasses.

 

[sanchezero]

I shoot alot at an indoor range so I have tons...

1. Took my girlfriend shooting, maybe her 2nd or 3rd time ever, and one of her shots (9mm) came back and hit me in the face breaking my glasses into 3 pcs and cutting my forehead. It felt like I got punched in the head by a vicious 12yr old girl .

2. At a defensive pistol class I watched a 45ACP rnd as it lobbed straight at me and land at my feet as if it were tossed back by the backstop gremlins. Other than a small flat spot, it looked ready to load (or maybe run ballistic tests on; distinct rifling marks).

3. Our local club had a shotgun stage in one of our matches (indoor again) where everyone fired 3-4 rnds of birdshot at bowling pins. All of the non-shooters were under a near constant hail of lead rain. None of it hurt, it was just irritating.

 

[JonnyB]

About 20 years ago, I was told a story by one of the guys who was present at this particular "event".

A few guys were out in the boonies of southern Minnesota shooting pistols, when a youngster - 15 or so - saw a crow in the plowed field. It was, they estimated, about 500 yards out, and the boy told the others he was going to shoot it. They, of course laughed and hooted at his insanity.

He takes aim, holding high - he has a single action in .45 Colt - and touched off a round. The bullet hits the frozen dirt about halfway to the crow, and everyone laughs. But... an instant later, the crow explodes in a cloud of black feathers!

After a stunned silence, one of the old-timers exclaims "Son, if that bullet hadn't hit that crow, lightning woulda struck it."

True? Dunno, but the guy who told me claims it is.

JB

 

[Johnpl]

Shooting 22 long rifle hollow points at a turtle sunning himself on top of a 55 gallon drum lying on its side with about 6 inches showing above the water line...my buddy took a shot, which hit the drum just below the turtle, richoceted up into the turtle from the underside, launching said turtle about 10 feet straight up into the air.