[John Jamieson]

Another possibility: The sniper story was quick cover-your-ass comment by a tank commander who missed the top story of some building near the river. The hotel was over a mile away. This will probably turn out to be an overshoot. There was no second tank round.

If the US wanted the hotel taken out, there would be no hotel.

[dsmtoday]

That was my point earlier - I had noticed that there was a two story building between the tanks and the hotel. This shorter building had a snipers nest on top of it (sandbags).

[rolling_stone]

One of the early reports I heard was that the tank was firing at the top of the building (didn't detail which bldg) and missed....interesting possibility...

[proust]

dpends on which gun they used. It looks like the tank commanders M2 50 cal machine gun, or the gunners M240 7.62mm coax machine took out the cameraman. Both guns are accurate up to 1 mile. The main gun is accuate up to 2 miles.