when u see those wankers shooting guns straight up in the air, how come you don't see anyone falling down dead

Question

from the falling bullits; seeing as though gravity and stuff?

a "wanker" is a slang term, common to australia, it means masturbation; you know jerking off!!

I do watch the mythbusters, but must have missed that particular episode with the firearm shot straight up. lol.

Answer 1

In the mythbusters episode, they found that if a gun was fired exactly straight up the bullet would come down without fatal velocity because it would tumble when it reached its peak, and land sideways, enough to hurt you but not to kill you. However even the slightest angle of the gun off to the side made it possible for the bullet to come down point-first, and kill somebody if it hit them. They also showed medical records of people dying that way. The only reason people don't die this way all the time is because the bullets land pretty much in random places nearby, and the chances of getting hit are slim unless they're firing up inside a city.
So don't shoot your gun up, doofus.

Answer 2

Oh, puddin', you weren't paying attention when they taught you about parabolas in school, were you? Things that go up do come down, but not straight down. Parabolas are like that big arch in St. Louis, or half of the McDonald's yellow "M". So unless somebody were standing exactly at the end of the parabola where the bullet fell to, they wouldn't get hit, and besides, the bullet wouldn't have that much force at that point because it would only be the force of gravityxthe weight of the bullet, which is tiny. Or maybe the bullet goes way far away and goes into orbit around the world. Maybe when that Virgin Airlines guy makes the space plane, he'll get hit with a bunch of orbiting bullets. He should be careful

Answer 3

there's alot of velocity coming out so the bullet goes very high and depending on the weather conditions could be pushed downwind or what not. A bullet travels at 670 m/s neglecting wind resistance so in one second it's over 1,000 feet in the air and it has a hypothetical maximum of 45,000 meters. I'd say a bullet fired into the air definitely can get up to 10, 20, maybe 30,000 feet in the air before it starts to come down. It will definitely hit terminal velocity. We can calculate terminal velocity of a bullet by the eqation V=sqrt ( (2 * W) / (Cd * r * A) where Cd equals the drag coefficient (.295), r is the atmospheric density, W is the weight and A is the area of the object. Sparing all the math I came out to a number roughly around 112 m/s as its terminal velocity. It goes from 670m/s up going down to 112 m/s which can still kill you somewhere down range.

Answer 4

Hi my name is Hank. The answer to your question is ballistics, windage, elevation and gravity, all variables, which affect the bullet's travel path. Even though the bullet is shot straight up, the variables involved usually means the bullet will land far from where the shooter was standing at the time the shot occurred.

You should have been around when somebody as intelligent as Sir Isaac Newton was alive to answer your question. If you would study Sir Isaac and his writings, I'm certain you will find a detailed answer. Myself, my name is Hank, not Sir Isaac. I'm not that intelligent.

What is a "wanker?" In the Midwest, that is a derogatory name for penis. I thought "Answers" would screen against that kind of language.

Hank Feral

Answer 5

The idiots with the guns would have to be shooting them at a perfect angle, straight up, and comensating for wind, to get them to come back down right on top of themselves. When they fire their weapons up in the air, you'll notice that it's never straight up.. so, if you know the type of weapon, the type of ammunition, the angle of the weapon when it's fired, the velocity of the bullets when they leave the barrell of the weapon, the wind velocity, the density of the air, then you could figure out approximately how vertically and how far horizontally they will travel.... and if you could drive to that location and there were people there, then you might see some being hit by these stray bullets.

Answer 6

First of all, ppl NEVER shoot straight up; basically, you cant even if you feel like you did.

Even if you did fire straight up, when the bullet coming downward, there is a thing called air resistance, the bullet will reach its terminal velocity, which is a lot less than its inital firing velocity; also, the bullet will not be straight down but fly like a leave. So, mostly likely, if you fire straight up and the bullet falls down and actually hit someone, he will get a terrible bruise but wont get killed.

Answer 7

You can be killed by a falling bullet, but it's not very likely that you will be hit by one.

Also, the falling bullets are moving much slower than when they come out of the gun, so they are less likely to kill you if they hit.

It's the same as if you drop a small fishing sinker off a tall building.

Answer 8

Because your looking up in the air.... Actually the chance of the bullet coming down and hitting someone is like one snowflake falling and happening to hit someone. And only idiots are shooting actual guns in the air for sporting events etc they use blanks.

Answer 9

The bullets go very high up into the air, and depending on weather conditions, are far away from where they started. People do get killed by bullets coming down, but it doesn't happen very often.

Answer 10

because dead people can't talk, some one shot guns in the air in my neighborhood and my son caught a bullet to the back of the neck, he's blessed to be alive, but the authorities could make no arrest, because they don' t know where the bullet came from