Posted on 05/21/2008 10:00:12 PM PDT by Darren McCarty
In his living room, Jonathan Schiefla felt the bullet hit his leg. The family cat, on the window sill, flew with the broken glass.
Schiefla told his wife to hit the floor.
In the distance, gunshots -- target practice south of their Coopersville home -- kept going off. He called 911, while wife Danyle kept pressure on his wound until rescuers arrived.
"It's something you don't expect to happen, being on your living-room floor watching television," he said Wednesday. "I'm just glad our little boy wasn't around."
Ottawa County sheriff's deputies identified four people -- two men, two women, ages from 17 to 23 -- who were shooting at targets in Polkton Township, a half-mile south of the Schieflas' mobile-home park. Detective Lt. Mark Bennett described the four as cooperative, unaware that the bullet, which crossed Int. 96, had traveled so far and hit anyone.
The shooting Tuesday night sent Schiefla, a 25-year-old landscaper, to Spectrum Health Butterworth Hospital, where doctors removed the .45-caliber slug that entered the back of his upper right leg and lodged in front, without hitting bone.
Police are in the process of determining which one of them fired the shot. Bennett said they were shooting at targets, but pending a prosecutor's review would not disclose the backstop used to protect others from errant shots.
Police reports showed that four guns, at least three of them handguns, were being fired. The guns were believed to be legally possessed for target practice in the township.
The four did not realize they were shooting in the direction of homes, with woods blocking the shooting area from the highway and mobile-home park.
"As bad as it turned out, it could've been even worse," Bennett said.
(Excerpt) Read more at blog.mlive.com ...
The owner of that range must have been rather ignorant of the power of that round to permit firing it on his range.
The first purpose of the .50 cal was as an anti-armor rifle.
My thinking, too. In that event, what were they thinking?!?
They have no excuse in Grand Rapids for recklessly shooting outdoors....Theres a perfectly wonderful indoor range called the Silver Bullet...an awesome place..:)
Visited it while I had my motorcycle serviced down the street at the dealership..:)
One would fire a .50BMG indoors once.
Not twice.
My guess would be one of the girls [or girly men] doubled or flinched, resulting in a high trajectory ???
reminds me of the ooolllllld EX...we put a .357 desrt eagle in her hand, got her lined up and bang...she immediately TURNS AROUND to hand off the rock&roll ready pistol to somebdy else...immense pucker factor...
when 'rules' arnt important/followed, bad things happen quickly, sometimes its just plain sh!t happenz...
About 10-12 years ago, the police missed the berm at their range and hit houses in a neighboring state. I have yet seen anyone top that.
(They were firing full-auto .223’s at targets placed on top of the berm instead of in front of it. Stupid. The range was next to the river that separates my state from another state. Total distance was about a mile.)
I’d imagine that with these facts, the “backstop” was the sky.
And you know that how?
Most rural counties have no ordinances requiring any specific “range” facility be used for firing. Although common sense (well...) dictates that you insure your rounds are contained in a suitable backstop, there is no legal requirement. Otherwise how would one hunt (involves discharging a round at a finicky not very well disiplined critter)?
Most likely an unfortunate, preventable incident; not a crime.
God Bless
Hmmm. Mid range trajectory of a 230 grain 45 ACP is about 1.5 inches low at 50 yds, 5.7” low at 100 yds per the 2008 Hornady manual, not hardly 6-8 ft.
Geesh! “facts” like yours are fodder for the anti’s!
God Bless
I recently took the NRA Range Safety Officer certfication course. The instructor told the story of a SoCal gunshop that had a small test range for the on-site gunsmith. One day part of the backstop was removed for maintenance, but they forgot to tell the ‘smith. He came in that night to test a .303 Enfield he had being doing some work on. Ended up firing a large number of rounds through a parked Walmart trailer truck loaded with big screen TVs and into the Walmart store itself. The gunstore went out of business due to the resulting lawsuits.
Only the totally inexperienced would fire a .50BMG indoors once. That single experience would be a life-lasting memory.
A .45 ACP will only travel 1/2 mile if the bullet is fired a a significant elevation above horizontal.
There are only three possibilities. In order of probabiliity:
1. Deliberately firing "up in the air".
2. Negligent Discharge
3. Firing at an elevated target with no backstop.
All of these have enough negligence associated with them to support at least a charge of reckless endangerment.
Maybe Law Enforcement is being kind to the victim and doing enough research to point out the target of a civil suit, but I am convinced that there is a criminal act in here somewhere.
If you can find a forth possibility, please explain.
And it might have been a .45 LC and not a .45 ACP.
45 LC out of a lever gun will carry a long way.
Of course if it was .45 ACP to get it a half mile you have to aim a good bit above horizontal. I have shot up to 300 yards with mine and at that range you are lining the rear sights with... nothing. It if just line them up somewhere below the bottom of the front sight and guess.
Heheh. I'm not an instructor, but I always start by giving the kids one round, and I keep them that way until I'm pretty sure they are patterned in and aren't going to shoot me. I agree with and practice the "never let them get out of reach" rule too.
“You shouldn’t have fired that .50BMG indoors!”
“WHAT??”
“You shouldn’t have fired...”
“WHAT...??”
You have the link to the story your reading because I sure don’t see where your getting all yer info there Curly Dave ?
Disagree till we have more info ....I have seen DOD , LEO and local city and private shooting ranges where rounds have got out beyond the berms. It happens . No one knows what happens but everybody is ready too get their panties in a wad over this . Unless there are more links that I have missed here on this thread I just see an incident with a sh*tload of speculating by the chicken little crowd.
Wait for the facts vs the what ifs is my suggestion !
Hope yer well......Stay safe !
It is slow moving however. If the sun is low at your back, and you sight over the iron sights, you can actually see the bullet travel down range after it gets polished through the barral. The described arc is not flat, but it is no where near the parabola you describe.
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