22 June 2017

Modern war

A sniper with Canada’s elite special forces in Iraq has shattered the world record for the longest confirmed kill shot in military history at a staggering distance of 3,450 metres.
Sources say a member of Joint Task Force 2 killed an Islamic State insurgent with a McMillan TAC-50 sniper rifle while firing from a high-rise during an operation that took place within the last month in Iraq.

“Canada has a world-class sniper system. It is not just a sniper. They work in pairs. There is an observer,” a military source said. “This is a skill set that only a very few people have.”

“It is at the distance where you have to account not just for the ballistics of the round, which change over time and distance, you have to adjust for wind, and the wind would be swirling,” said a source with expertise in training Canadian special forces.

“You have to adjust for him firing from a higher location downward and as the round drops you have to account for that. And from that distance you actually have to account for the curvature of the Earth.”
I presume the sniper takes a series of preliminary shots at objects at the same distance, and the observer tells him how much he missed by so that he can compensate.

7 comments:

  1. the distances have increased a lot since electronics have been added into the equation. i would to see these modern shootists do that (distance and accuracy) with just paper and pencil. on a target range, of course.

    I-)

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  2. btw, no preliminary shots. that's where the shootist / observer / electronics skill comes in to play.

    I-)

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  3. A preliminary shot could serve as a warning to the intended target that shots were being fired. One thing that is impressive to me is that if the target was moving, that had to be taken into account, due to the travel time of the bullet.

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    Replies
    1. A preliminary shot could be 300 yards to the left or right (to assess the correctness of the settings and also the one thing that can't be "calculated" - the effect of intervening winds). It would not provide a warning because it would be essentially silent (most sound from a bullet firing coming from the barrel, not from the target).

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    2. 300 yards to the right or the left is a whole different ballistics equation. the sound of the gun being fired would be heard all around, regardless of which way the barrel is pointed.

      I-)

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  4. This blows my mind! And what better to use for target practice than an ISIS insurgent?

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  5. How about 1500 yds in 1874, with a Sharps .50? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Battle_of_Adobe_Walls#Billy_Dixon.27s_lucky_shot

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