# Your experiences with a ricochet



## CW (Mar 20, 2015)

Wife just beaned her first chuck this season, an afterward became concerned with a possible ricochet.

Now a 22mag HP is going to plow into the ground real quick especially after passing through a critter,

and I've seen .45 acp drill into the ground 8 inches from a plywood target backboard,

but what has been your experience with ricochets?


I remember only one, a .223 FMJ off a dirt mound. I heard the "per-weeeee" but the round clobbered open field within 50 yards.

FMJ + flat shot + hard surface (might have hit a rock in the clay-shale dirt). I've passed up many shots since then, even when hollow-points are being used.


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## Steve M1911A1 (Feb 6, 2008)

We were running a pistol match on a "square range" set at 45° to the rifle range on which a rifle event was going on.
One of our guys suffered a ricochet while the riflemen were downrange taping their targets. It was really noisy, as heard from down the rifle range, but the bullet's path was definitely away from the rifle people.

Nevertheless, one of their most hair-trigger members came storming onto the pistol range, looking for blood. I was the first person he encountered, he was at least twice my size, and I found myself dangling by my shirt about a foot off of the ground as he vented in my face.

One of the other pistol range officers came over and talked him down before he got too violent. That's when I told him that, like all of the rest of us, I was carrying a fully-loaded pistol on our "hot" range.

He was a lot calmer after that, so we quietly explained that the pistol bullet he heard was headed away from, not toward, him. That settled the issue.


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## Goldwing (Nov 5, 2014)

I was at a gathering in a rural setting in mid-winter, bonfire, beer food and good friends. Anyway one of the guys had a mag full of tracer rounds for his Mini-Fourteen. He shot round after round into the hillside and into the flat area before the hill. The ground was frozen with a couple of feet of frost below the surface. Almost every round went nearly vertical after hitting the snow covered ground. I expected them to bank off the earth at the same angle they were fired into it.

GW


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## Ookami86 (Dec 20, 2014)

I was shooting at one of those rolling/bouncing reactive targets with my 1911 9mm one winter and felt something hitting my chest. I thought it was spent casings since it tends to eject rearward. When I finally looked down there was a pile of bullets at my feet. They'd lost all of their energy but I only shoot at that target with rifles at longer range now.
At the indoor range I go to occassionally there are a surprising number of ricochets. One time and chunk of lead came back and put a nice cut in my buddy's forehead.


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## Steve M1911A1 (Feb 6, 2008)

One more story, but not truly a ricochet...

At another pistol match, one of the steel targets was angled badly, and a fragment of bullet lead came back at me and buried itself in the heel of my left hand.
After the match was over, and everything put away, I stopped at my local Kaiser-Permanente emergency room on my way home.

"What's the trouble?" asked the triage nurse.
"I've got a fragment of lead in my hand," I replied.
"How'd it happen?"
So I explained.

"Gunshot wound!" she loudly called out, and in seconds there were two cops standing there.
They took a formal statement, and needed witnesses' names and addresses. I remembered a few.
"Um, guys, it was self-inflicted," I reminded them.
"Don't say that!" they said, "Or we'll have to write it down as a suicide attempt. Stick to saying that it was an accidental shooting."
Evidently, there were only a few specific choices which could be checked-off on the report.

Finally, I was allowed to see a doctor, who removed the splinter and applied a band-aid.
Then I went home.

It was California, after all.


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## SouthernBoy (Jun 27, 2007)

Maybe 45 years ago, I was shooting at some dumped stuff in a wooded area with a Ruger Blackhawk .357 Magnum 6 1/2" barrel. I had FMJ ammo with me at the time. I found an empty oxygen bottle and wanted to see if I could put a hole in it. So I fired at it and the bullet bounced back and hit me in my right shin bone. Hurt like hell and made a nasty welt but didn't break the skin (had jeans on at the time).


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## CW (Mar 20, 2015)

I had a friend who was out deer hunting and found a nice buck to harvest. Going prone, he utilized the cover of abandoned railroad roadbed and "in-jun'd" up close to a position to shoot.

He laid the cross hairs right on.

Forgetting the drop from scope to bore is like 2-3 inches, he shot right into the rail head, receiving metal splinters in the face.

Many years later, when seeking treatment for another eye issue, the pre-MRI exam revealed fragments still in his face around the scope eye- 
apparently the metal (and some steel) came back 180 deg.


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## Goldwing (Nov 5, 2014)

I don't know how to post a link, but check out "50 cal. ricochet" on youtube.

GW


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