Falling bullet

If you drop a penny off the Empire State Building it would crush a dump truck or so I was told in 4th grade.

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I would think the terminal velocity of a bullet would be quit slow especially after passing through an insulated metal roof.

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If it was a nearly straight up and down path. If the bullet followed a more parabolic trajectory then much more energy would be retained. I've found bullets embedded in house roofs, some nearly though the decking and that certainly would have been bad hit to person's skull.

For it to fall straight down through a roof it would have to be shot from roughly the same location where it landed. So unless someone was on/in that dollar general yeeting bullets 90° to the earth then it was someone potentially miles away depending on caliber. Hell a wimpy 9mm shot at 45° will travel 2 miles before hitting the ground, with a .308 being able to travel 3-4 miles.

A bullet shot at ANY angle that isn't 90° will retain some forward momentum in addition to terminal velocity. You only need 59 ft/lbs to be lethal. For a 115gr 9mm round that is about 500fps, or about 1/2-1/3 muzzle velocity. Look I'm not gonna do the calculus for bullet ballistics at 530am but I think you get the point.

The facts are that a moderately sized handgun or rifle fired into the air a mile away at a decently high angle could still possess enough kinetic energy to punch a hole through a paper thin dollar general metal roof and cut someone's hand. Its not a physica issue, it's just pure luck that a bullet hit ole boy.

I remember in BR in the early 2000’s a girl was killed on New Year’s Eve from a bullet that was fired into the air. I’ll try to find an article. I remember thinking “damn the bad luck”

Thought I read some time ago that some country, capital, or large city at NY's they go outside and shoot guns in the air with more than 10 people getting killed because of this.

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I remember in BR in the early 2000’s a girl was killed on New Year’s Eve from a bullet that was fired into the air. I’ll try to find an article. I remember thinking “damn the bad luck”

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This is the one I remember, made national news, and was during the time me and my friends frequented New Orleans.

Boston Tourist Killed in New Orleans by Stray Bullet

That is weird but a lot of the old DG buildings are just prefab steel buildings with a little insulation on top of some drop cieling tiles, so there ain't much to slow it down. I've even seen some that don't even have drop ceilings in them.

Some of the newer DG buildings are more than just a prefab building. I'd like to see what kind this place was.

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LINK

Then use this calculator: Free Fall calculator

9mm would be traveling 504 ft/sec

30-06 would be traveling 802 ft/sec

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Actually, this is the correct calculator: Free Fall with Air Resistance

The bullet would reach terminal velocity, assuming it is shot high enough. This is the velocity where air drag force (air friction) is equal to gravitation acceleration.

According to this article Free Falling Bullet, a 30 caliber bullet has a terminal velocity of around 250-290 fps (150-200 mph). So, that is still potentially enough kinetic energy to break skin & enter the body, but it is unlikely it would penetrate sheet metal (and likely roof insulation) and still have deadly kinetic energy.

Dad has found at least one bullet on the floor of the airplane hanger that came through the roof and insulation. Larger caliber.

In the hood, on NYE (and other not so special occasions), it happens a lot. There are a lot of non-thinkers out there who own rifles.