Replies

“1. It was dark and no matter how well lit, there are many shadows to hide in.

Response- 22000 people in about a three or four acre area- that’s a dense target area. Assuming he was firing with a FA or even a bump fire stock equipped AR 15 223/556, off a bag or bipod etc, using 60 and 30 round magazines, rotating between 12 optic or dot equipped rifles, a reasonably astute person with a modicum of experience indeed could fire a few magazines before the effects could really be appreciated by the concert goers- loud music, the press of the crowd, people begin dropping, folks start saying “WTF?”, eventually in a minute or two or four (about 6, 60 round mags worth of time), the music stops, gunfire is heard and crowd start reacting-shock at first, then disorientation a to where to go/ where the fire is coming from, more bursts into a the milling crowd that is beginning to react/panic/take cover/ stand there with mouths open.

2. Simple a ‘sear’ (pronounced see-er) modification would have only permitted one entire magazine to shoot all at once with no select fire (being able to start and stop).

Response- true enough, but we know that the weapons were bump-fire stock equipped, so that is irrelevant, no?

3. There are some devices (like AutoGlove and Bump Fire) that can simulate full automatic fire, but they cannot be used accurately or effectively.

Response- I can assure you that FA fire from a bipod-equipped supported AR/M16 is very controllable in regards to an area target- The military uses FA fires to suppress an area so another element can maneuver against it. In this case, FA fire/simulated FA fire was simply used to murder folks. Indeed, the shooter could have used precise aimed fires, but that would be slow and actually not effective since the effect apparently was not an assassination of a specific target, but mass murder for terror effect.

4. Even if the shooter was able to somehow obtain a full normal functioning automatic rifle, anyone with military experience can tell you that the rifles are difficult to control when firing more than 3 round bursts – especially a .308 or AK47 type. This is because the rifle will uncontrollably rise if automatic fire is constant.

Response- True enough from unsupported firing positions against a point target, but actually very effective against an area target and groups of persons vice a specific individual. even heavier calibers like 762 Nato/762x 54 RUS are very controllable from heavier weapon systems like M240, RPK/Ms etc. He used, from the pictures, 223/556 caliber rifles.

5. After the first 15 or so seconds, the crowd scattered and took cover.

Response- see #1 above- I estimated it took two to three minutes for the crowd to begin to scatter and react ONCE they decided they were being shot, and I estimate it took that long for them to realize they were being shot, so 3-4 minutes under fire with either no awareness or inability to react due to the press of the crowd.

6. I don’t have a count of how many pieces of empty brass (fired rounds) they have recovered, but knowing how many shots were fired compared to how many people were hit will tell you the hit ratio. If this guy did this in 20 seconds, we needed him desperately in Afghanistan!

Response- again, he had, I believe, about 3-4 minutes where he was indeed shooting into a fish bowl. 200 effective RndsPerMin ( including time for reload/rifle swap) X 3 minutes=600 rounds.... We don’t need folks like him in FG, we need them on death row, or better yet, cooling off in the morgue. Also, rounds passing through limbs etc likely caused secondary wounds, bullets fragmenting on the pavement and ricocheting caused additional wounds. Hit ratio is pretty much irrelevant when sardines in a fish bowl are the target.

7. To fire 500 aimed shoots and swap out magazines would have taken him about 15-20 minutes, and there is no way that each shot would have hit someone – more than likely would have missed.”

Response- HE DIDN’T fire aimed shots, he sprayed an area full of crowded folks who had little or no awareness for up to several minutes (with optic sighted supported weapons from an almost ideal location), then another lengthy period of time (relative to amount of incoming rounds) to continue to engage the slowly moving but still tight crowd ( think slinky effect of traffic on the crowed freeway) to fire rapid bursts of fairly well aimed area fires into a target rich environment.

Summary- Indeed, given the dynamics of the noise/ crowd/area constraints and time to awareness, he had lots of time to kill 58 and wound 500+, the bastard was rather efficient in his dastardly, cowardly task. He fired apparently for 11 minutes. with regular bursts with moderate pauses for him to swap rifles/reload. He did not have to hurry a bit. I personally don’t think he was either an amateur ( maybe not a Spartan type) or even not alone, at least in the planning and logistics if not the actual rampage.