How Dangerous Is A Bullet Shot In The Air | New year message 2022

 celebrating their various triumphs with some good old-fashioned upwards gunfire. After all, nothing says   “We just overthrew the government” quite like pointing your gun to the sky and let ‘ner rip. It’s essentially the gun-lovers fist-pump. But is it possible that this seemingly innocent expression of gun-based joy could be… dare I say it...  dangerous? Perish the thought!

So there you are, chuffed to bits at the  victory of your preferred political candidate, and overcome with an irrepressible urge to celebrate in the only way your know-how. You grab whatever loaded firearm you have handy,  rush outside, and start gleefully firing off round after round into the air just as nature intended,  when suddenly, a chilling thought falls upon you; these bullets have to come back down eventually, right? Unsurprisingly, the answer to  this question is an emphatic“yes, you idiot!”

When a gun is fired, several different  factors determine the bullet’s path through the air on the way to its target. One of the first  things to consider is ‘muzzle velocity, which is, very simply, the speed at which a bullet is moving the moment it leaves the gun barrel, or ‘muzzle’.This can vary considerably depending on  the kind of gun and round being used; the ever-popular AK-47 for instance is capable of  firing bullets at around 715 meters per second, or about 2,350 feet per second,while in modern rifles, some of the fastest high-performance cartridges can reach the muzzle velocities of well over 1,200 meters per second, or about 4,000 feet per second.

Due to the effects of air resistance, bullets  slow down pretty quickly after they’ve been fired, and follow a route determined  by a variety of factors, including things like ATMOSPHERIC  pressure, humidity, and air temperature. However, the thing that pulls a fired  bullet downwards is plain old gravity, which, assuming those other aforementioned  variables aren’t having an overwhelming effect, ensures that bullets travel back to earth in a roughly parabolic path.Now, celebratory gunfire differs substantially  from regular gunfire in that it is generally not directed at people you want to shoot, but upwards  and away from those you’re celebrating with,  

who you don’t want to hit  (well, not usually anyway).

That way, the bullets just disappear up into space, right?

At least, that’s what people used to think. Early,  pre-seventeenth century studies. suggested that bullets shot upwards do somehow achieve  escape velocity and peace out into space, we now know that all bullets shot from the  surface of Earth never even leave the troposphere, the lowest layer of our planet’s atmosphere,  and unless you’re watching this from the International Space Station,  the one you’re in right now. In reality, when a bullet is fired directly upwards, the upward force accelerating the bullet drops off entirely the moment it leaves the chamber.  

At this point, the bullet is at its maximum velocity and has its maximum kinetic energy. As the bullet accelerates downward, its velocity increases; as does the air resistance, and when a bullet falls naturally it will often spin and tumble in the air, further increasing the air resistance and slowing its acceleration significantly. When gravity and air resistance balance out,  the bullet will hit its terminal velocity,  meaning it will no longer go any faster.

The question is, are bullets falling at this speed still dangerous? Well,  

The terminal velocity of a falling bullet will vary depending on the type of bullet, but, generally speaking - yes, very much so.in 1920 the U.S. military conducted a series of tests on falling bullets......and found that a .30 caliber  round can reach terminal velocities of 90 meters per second, or just over 200 miles per hour. A .30 caliber round can breakthrough skin while traveling at  speeds as low as 37 meters per second, or 85 miles per hour. As you can see, falling bullets  have more than enough energy to cause you harm, possibly worse.

And that’s just regarding falling bullets;  In reality, people celebrating things with gunfire aren’t generally bothered about making sure that their weapon is perfectly vertical. If a gun is fired at a sufficiently shallow angle, instead of stalling and falling, the bullet will often retain its angular ballistic trajectory and continue on its parabolic path, making it far less likely to begin tumbling in the air. As a result, such bullets will lose considerably less speed compared to a bullet in freefall, and will be traveling much faster when they hit the ground… or whatever gets in its way first.

But if all that fancy maths and  science talk isn’t sufficient to convince you that the threat from  falling ammunition is very real indeed, there are unfortunately numerous real-life examples of this happening. As it happens, firing off a few rounds with  the lads is not a particularly uncommon phenomenon and is a culturally acceptable way to  celebrate in several places around the world, In 2012, a study conducted in the United States  found that a not-insignificant 4.6% of all deaths and injuries from stray bullets “occur as a direct result of celebratory gunfire”. The list of incidents is sadly not a short one and features examples from all over the world.

In 2003, during a traditional  Serbian wedding celebration, guests shot down a small plane while firing into the skies, injuring the two men onboard. In 2007, at least four people were killed and many more injured as a result of stray bullets from celebratory gunfire after the Iraqi national football team won the AFC Asian Cup that year. In 2021, militant leaders claimed to take control of part of Afghanistan.  Their resulting celebratory gunfire injured 41  people and led to the deaths of at least 17. Back in 1999, a teenager called Shannon  Smith was killed after being struck in  the head by a stray bullet while outside in her backyard in Arizona.

This prompted the state to enact ‘Shannon’s Law’, which made it illegal to discharge a firearm into the air in Arizona's cities and towns. Indeed, in some respects, falling bullets may even be considered more  dangerous than regular gunfire. Between  1985 and 1992, a group of physicians at the Martin Luther King/Drew medical center in  Los Angeles studied victims of gunshot wounds, identifying 118 who had been struck by falling bullets. Compared to those hurt in your average, boring, run-of-the-mill shootings, who died  at rates of between 2 and 6 percent, the death rate of those unlucky enough to be hit by fall bullets was around a third.

This is because, despite moving at slower speeds,  bullets falling to the ground vertically are far more likely to hit you in the top of the head compared to other less-lethal points of the body. ...celebratory gunfire is not particularly uncommon, and the risk that it poses is very real indeed. So the next time your football team wins, or you’re just jazzed about it being New Year, it might be a good idea not to randomly pump the sky full of lead. Stick to confetti cannons instead.