I was in the 82nd’s air defense battalion. We give classes at the ranges in shooting at aircraft. We had radio controlled styrofoam airplanes that would fly back and forth in front of a hundred guys with M-16’s, M-60’ MG’s. They’d hardly ever get hit. Five, or more passes.
I doubt the gunner hit the jet. He said he only had one gun working and he was untrained.
Besides, neither the Libyan or the Syrian ejected.
Hmmm, maybe bad maintenance, and/or disabling of the
ejector mechanism? One of the other videos has the wreckage
of a plane from which the pilot ejected after refusing to attack civilians. Maybe the safety pins were tack-welded in place?
Sometimes by dumb luck an aircraft can hit a bullet in a vulnerable spot. An untrained gunner, I agree, will definitely fail to apply proper lead. Ya never know, though.
BTW, were your students using tracers?