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You said:"A jet engine at the starting end of the runway coming directly toward the shooter would have virtually no relative motion, it would just appear to grow in size. Easy shot." I said:"Maybe an easy shot. HOWEVER, your shot would have to be REALLY lucky to just damage the engine enough so that four minutes later, catastrophic engine failure occurs. If you shoot it while it's coming towards you on takeoff and catastrophic engine failure occurs while the plane is moving towards you, you are likely to find yourself in (part of) the debris field. Could someone be THAT lucky? Sure, I guess so, but I can't work through the amount of problems that this scenario would present.

There are far easier ways to bring down an aircraft than trying to do it with a .50 caliber rifle"

I GRANTED that it would be an easy shot. I granted that it could be done. You posited that I had to prove your hypothesis didn't work. I asked for more information.

As far as spending time shooting a rifle, Gee, I dunno, but maybe the range in my back yard DOESN'T make me a really good shot.

You also stated in an earlier post (And I agreed) that a .50 caliber (or smaller) round passing through an aircraft engine WOULD destroy the engine. Dramatically, catastrophically, and immediately. The only thing I take issue with is that you stated that the engine would be destroyed when shot, but this engine didn't explode until 4 minutes later. So, either, you missed your hypothetical shot, (at the 12 FOOT gong), or you are the luckiest terrorist in the world, what with having that delay damage to the jet engine.

Also, BTW, your posts go nowhere NEAR over my head. It's just impossible to follow so many hypothetical concepts at once.

Foreign Object Damage (FOD) is a very high threat for the workings of a Jet engine . The turbines picking up something as small as a cotter pin can be damaged and thus put into play a self destruct sequence that could be instant or delayed. That is based on personal experience.

The perfect balance of the fans rotating at a gazillion rpms knocked off balance via anything ingested would cause the engine to self destruct and if damage was slow enough the imbalance would be analogous of a blowout of the tire on yer family cruiser only a hundred times faster or better. Now that cotter pin can be a nut with a bullet or just a nut dropped by the mechanic on the runway etc etc

Golden BB theory is valid, and has worked against even the best and fastest of military aircraft. A shooter laying amoung the VASI lights at the departure end could do the deed.

As to TM's suggestion about National Guard/Wooden Indian comments, I agree 100%. They should be looking versus just looked at.