Bullets Come Down: Help Stop Celebratory Gunfire this New Years

Million Mom March (united with the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence) ^ | 12/23/2004 | Brady Campaign/MMM

[Welsh Rabbit]

Last year, it became such a problem in Puerto Rico that the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention were called in for advice.

Huh?

[Still Thinking]

There you go again, insisting on accuracy from liberals! I was assuming there were actually a million moms, thus... ;-)

[spodefly]

The practice of celebratory gunfire has been a problem in cities like Miami, New Orleans, Phoenix and Los Angeles and in towns along the U.S. and Mexico border. Last year, it became such a problem in Puerto Rico that the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention were called in for advice.

I was wondering who the idiots were that were firing into the air. I have lived muy whole life around guns and other gun owners and I have NEVER ONCE seen anyone fire a gun into the air. It had to be a "multicultural" thing ...

[Condor51]

It is a Third World tradition and as we've increasingly opened our nation up to Third World immigrants we've allowed their customs to follow as well.

You're being waaaaay too nice.
Note the areas and cities that are cited in this press release; "Miami, New Orleans, Phoenix and Los Angeles and in towns along the U.S. and Mexico border. Last year, it became such a problem in Puerto Rico ...."

As such, to be effective this release should be in freaking SPANISH.

[Mister Sophisticate]

The law enforcement folks on patrol will park their vehicle under concrete overpasses at midnight to avoid falling bullets.

Yep, that's the smart move. Every year it seems, at least one person in Los Angeles takes a hit from a "stray" round that's been fired into the air at New Year's Eve midnight.

[weaponeer]

This danger is obviously an urban myth. Why, I've seen hundreds of rag-heads firing into the air on TV dozens of times. I've never once seen a media report of someone being hit by a falling bullet in Bagdad or Rahmalla. </sarcasm>

[Lurking Libertarian]

Interesting historical tidbit:

On New Year's Eve, 1913, in New Orleans, Louis Armstrong, then aged 11, was arrested for shooting a pistol into the air. He was sent to the "Colored Waif's Home" (reform school), where he received his first trumpet lesson....

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

Didn't you know that guns are a public health issue? Why, they should be treated just like airborne viral pathogens </SARCASM>

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

On New Year's Eve, 1913, in New Orleans, Louis Armstrong, then aged 11, was arrested for shooting a pistol into the air. He was sent to the "Colored Waif's Home" (reform school), where he received his first trumpet lesson....

And I say to myself, what a wonderful world...

[Drew68]

You're being waaaaay too nice.

I try...

As such, to be effective this release should be in freaking SPANISH.

Jeez, now that would be funny! Could you imagine the outcry if MMM released this press release in the language that its target audience speaks?

Me? I save my celebratory firing of guns into the air for Arbor Day.

< /sarcasm>

[IronJack]

This is what the Brady thieves are reduced to. Don't be fooled; this is simply a fallback tactic designed to give a little ground now so that they can take more later. It doesn't matter if this is a good idea or not; consider the source.

[Proud_texan]

Just an aside but the terminal velocity of even very large slugs is just a bit more than it takes to break the skin.

A .44 (which is the only one that I can recall) has a terminal velocity of 70-76 metres per second. Skin penetration is between 45 and 60 metres per second.

From personal experience (dove hunters shooting into me not knowing I was there) buckshot is akin to getting hit with a pea out of a pea shooter.

I don't condone the practice by any means but it would almost be impossible to be killed by a falling bullet. Think the deaths are proabably people who have been shot.

[KoRn]

Whenever I did this(as a kid) I would fire such rounds into the ground.

Now I believe anyone who gets out in the middle of the night on New Years Eve in the freezing cold to shoot a gun for the sake of making noise has some issues.......

[AdamSelene235]

From personal experience (dove hunters shooting into me not knowing I was there) buckshot is akin to getting hit with a pea out of a pea shooter.

Wow, buckshot for doves !! Just how big are those doves in Texas??

[Proud_texan]

Haha, how about birdshot. More and more often my fingers disregard what my brain tells them to do.

[Myrddin]

He moved to La Jolla and started using tracers...see post #14 (c8

He had moved or stopped the bad behavior by 1998/1999 New Year's Eve. I was sitting next to my wife for the 1999/2000 New Year's Eve as she was dispatching in the Sheriff's Office. I was feeling like a case of flu was chewing on me that night.

[Poser]

Nice spoof, but you didn't fool me.

[GeekDejure]

Calling Al Gore... Caling Al Gore...

Yeah, yeah, it's Al here. Wudaya want?

Listen, Al... I wuz just thinkin'...
Since you ivented this fabulous Internet...
Why don't you do us all another favor and
invent a Holiday Bullet that just keeps on
going up, and up, and up, and up, until it
plows into a Russian or Chinese space craft !!! ;-))

[TheGeezer]

I work at a 911 Center in the middle of a housing project. Every New Years' does about $10,000 damage to the flat roof, and every Spring the roof needs to be repaired. The roofers collect slugs that they find embedded in the old roof that cause the leaks, and I think last year they came up with about thirty slugs...

[bleach]

My father and I use to fire a shotgun into the ground for New Years until some wadding got lodged in the barrell. The next blast made the gun resemble a Warner Brothers cartoon with Elmer Fudd.

Years later we found the end of the barrell well over a hundred feet away down a hillside I was clearing. We never bothered with shotgun reloads after that.

Happy New Years to all!