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Wrong trousers?
02GF74 - 30/6/08 at 11:12 AM

no, wrong bullets!

Mr Whippy - 30/6/08 at 11:15 AM

oops

tegwin - 30/6/08 at 11:30 AM

Surely when you load your weapon you can tell the difference between the pointy live rounds and the stumpy blanks.....

iank - 30/6/08 at 11:33 AM

I'd guess he just stuck the wrong magazine in without looking.
Though why any of them would be carrying live ammo in that kind of display boggles.

UncleFista - 30/6/08 at 11:40 AM

But, wouldn't a professional soldier notice the lack of muzzle flash and rather more recoil from using real rounds before/while emptying the gun into a crowd

iank - 30/6/08 at 11:51 AM

quote:
Originally posted by UncleFista
But, wouldn't a professional soldier notice the lack of muzzle flash and rather more recoil from using real rounds before/while emptying the gun into a crowd


Probably, but that could have been one burst from an automatic weapon, even assuming the adrenalin wasn't flowing.

dmottaway - 30/6/08 at 11:57 AM

Still, you have got to question the wisdom of firing a weapon into a crowd, blanks or not.

dave

Mr Whippy - 30/6/08 at 12:08 PM

quote:
Originally posted by dmottaway
Still, you have got to question the wisdom of firing a weapon into a crowd, blanks or not.

dave


Exactly, heads will roll

David Jenkins - 30/6/08 at 12:18 PM

quote:
Originally posted by dmottaway
Still, you have got to question the wisdom of firing a weapon into a crowd, blanks or not.

dave


I doubt it was intentionally 'into the crowd' - more 'in the general direction of..'. As the general-purpose military round has a lethal range* of around 3 miles, 'approximate direction' is more than sufficient.

And you get less muzzle flash with a live round, not more, and a lot less smoke too (more efficient burning of the charge). If the soldier was hyped up he may not have noticed the difference in recoil - even a blank has some kick (it has to, to make the automatic mechanism work.)

I'm surprised that they didn't have the yellow 'muzzle-blockers' that the UK military use when on exercises - they wouldn't stop a bullet, but instantly show you when you've unexpectedly shot a live round.

The soldier was immediately arrested - now they're trying to find out if it was intentional or accidental.


* 'lethal range' is not the same as 'accurate range' - but they do go a long way if the elevation is right.

[Edited on 30/6/08 by David Jenkins]

mistergrumpy - 30/6/08 at 12:18 PM

quote:

an experienced soldier" should not be able to confuse blanks with real bullets.

A bleeding monkey could tell the difference. Live rounds have a domed pointy head (presuming high velocity rounds) or else a domed smooth head if low velocity and blanks have a crimped end. French eh! I refer you to Razmans earlier post here

[Edited on 30/6/08 by mistergrumpy]

iank - 30/6/08 at 12:26 PM

quote:
Originally posted by David Jenkins

The soldier was immediately arrested - now they're trying to find out if it was intentional or accidental.



And if it wasn't intentional I wouldn't want to be the armourer who signed out the 'blanks'.

02GF74 - 30/6/08 at 12:31 PM

it's gotta be deliberage.

like ^^^^ said already, the bullets are different appearance to blanks. for a reenactment firing into crowds doesn;t need to be accruate just as long as it is in the the general direction - 17 people being hits seems a bit too accurate (but then I don;t know the exact circumstances)

wouldn't t here be more recoil from the weapon (newstons law and all that).

wouldn't the screams, blood and the jerking of bodies as they got hit be a tell tale too?

seems very suspisicsious to me, even if I am having trouble spelling it.

Ivan - 30/6/08 at 12:34 PM

Going back to my Military experience of some 40 years ago an automatic rifle wouldn't reload with blanks without a muzzle blocker so I wonder if they where using plastic rounds which have a limited range and he just got too close to the crowd..

What makes me think that is the fact that there where so few fatalities although I believe that most modern military weapons are made to wound not kill as a wounded soldier is much more demoralising and resource intensive than a dead one.

But yes - the officer in charge should have a lot of explaining to do and should have been arrested with the soldier.

Mr Whippy - 30/6/08 at 12:45 PM

don't know, last time I fired a gun I nearly fell over from the recoil, I'm sure it would have been rather obvious that something was different

iank - 30/6/08 at 12:49 PM

quote:
Originally posted by 02GF74
it's gotta be deliberage.

like ^^^^ said already, the bullets are different appearance to blanks. for a reenactment firing into crowds doesn;t need to be accruate just as long as it is in the the general direction - 17 people being hits seems a bit too accurate (but then I don;t know the exact circumstances)

wouldn't t here be more recoil from the weapon (newstons law and all that).

wouldn't the screams, blood and the jerking of bodies as they got hit be a tell tale too?

seems very suspisicsious to me, even if I am having trouble spelling it.


You don't load individual bullets into an automatic weapon you load a magazine which is probably a good deal more difficult to distinguish. So the question becomes how did a magazine full of live rounds get taken into a display situation.

A modern assault weapon fires more than 10 rounds a second, so it's feasible that just one burst of live ammunition was fired, so people falling down/recoil becomes a bit after the fact.

DaveFJ - 30/6/08 at 12:52 PM

As Ivan says

An automatic or semi automatic rifle relies on a small amount of the expanding gas to be returned via a small piston to push the working parts backwards so they can engage and load a fresh round. with a blank there is no back pressure within the barrell and therefore no pressure on the piston. to get around this a BFA (blank firing attachment) is fitted to the end of the barrell which partially blocks the end causes a pressure build up when a blank is fired.

As for 'kick'.. there is a very small amount of kick felt when firing a blank but certainly nothing like a live round. that being said the more modren 5.56mm rounds produce little kick anyway (bring back 7.62!)

A blank can still be lethal at close range and it is every (British) soldiers training that you NEVER point a weapon at Anyone (even when unloaded) unless you intend to kill them!

Jon Hazan - 30/6/08 at 01:11 PM

As Dave pointed out blanks are just as dangerous as live rounds just their effective range is very small. Without the BFA on the end they will happily strip the laces off an army issue boot at half a meter :/ Not idea why the french soldiers would even think of pointing there guns at civilians blanks or not!

On the side of the soldier it is quiet possible he was issued with a magazine and rifle right before the display started, and if his magazine was half live and half blank its unlikely he would have spotted the problem.

JoelP - 30/6/08 at 05:14 PM

the bristish army has made the same mistake during a training excercise, resulting in the death of a young soldier. It resulted in another threat from the HSE to turn the army upside down.

However you look at it, this stuff just shouldnt happen.

James - 30/6/08 at 06:17 PM

I know it's off-topic but as there seem to be a few people with military knowledge/interest here....

Has anyone read Sniper One? By Sergeant Dan Mills?

It's for sale at Sainsbury's now for about a fiver. I read it non-stop... really interesting (and dramatic!) stuff about the PWRR's time in Al Amarah in Iraq.

Cheers,
James

Mark Allanson - 30/6/08 at 06:21 PM

quote:
Originally posted by Jon Hazan
As Dave pointed out blanks are just as dangerous as live rounds just their effective range is very small. Without the BFA on the end they will happily strip the laces off an army issue boot at half a meter :/ Not idea why the french soldiers would even think of pointing there guns at civilians blanks or not!

On the side of the soldier it is quiet possible he was issued with a magazine and rifle right before the display started, and if his magazine was half live and half blank its unlikely he would have spotted the problem.




He probably felt threatened by the 5 year old, he is french!

DaveFJ - 30/6/08 at 06:27 PM

quote:
Originally posted by Mark Allanson
quote:
Originally posted by Jon Hazan
As Dave pointed out blanks are just as dangerous as live rounds just their effective range is very small. Without the BFA on the end they will happily strip the laces off an army issue boot at half a meter :/ Not idea why the french soldiers would even think of pointing there guns at civilians blanks or not!

On the side of the soldier it is quiet possible he was issued with a magazine and rifle right before the display started, and if his magazine was half live and half blank its unlikely he would have spotted the problem.




He probably felt threatened by the 5 year old, he is french!



Thats another thing that is strange about his case.... a frenchman actually firing his weapon rather than laying it down and running away!!!


As for Sniper One... one of the best books i have read in a very long time! everyone should be forced to read it so they have a true understanding of what our lads are being asked to do on our behalves - and getting paid very poorly to do it!
I was lucky in that I left the Army as a Sergeant after 16 years and got out just before the second gulf war and before Afghanistan kicked off.....But I have a lot of friends out there!

[Edited on 30-6-08 by DaveFJ]

MikeRJ - 30/6/08 at 07:08 PM

quote:
Originally posted by James
IHas anyone read Sniper One? By Sergeant Dan Mills?

It's for sale at Sainsbury's now for about a fiver. I read it non-stop... really interesting (and dramatic!) stuff about the PWRR's time in Al Amarah in Iraq.


Cheers for that, will pick it up on the way home in a bit.