Damn, that’s impressive
Seen at Chaos in Motion:
A U.S. Army sniper set a new distance record (1250 meters) for a kill with a 7.62mm sniper rifle. Staff Sergeant Jim Gilliland made the shot on September 27, 2005, during fighting in Ramadi. The Leupold sight Gilliland used is only accurate out to a thousand meters, so the chest shot was partially guesswork, and luck. Gilliland aimed 12 feet high, to adjust for the drop the bullet would make over that distance. Gilliland later found out that the Iraqi he dropped had just killed a friend of his, Staff Sergeant Jason Benford.
That’s a helluva shot.
January 23rd, 2006 at 11:44 pm
That is superb shooting. At that distance the wind drift from nearly still air is as much as the stated bullet drop. If he was sighted in at 1000 meters as this news implies then he aimed a whole lot higher than 12 feet. Not that anyone was measuring … but I’m thinking his holdover was more like 28 feet. Check your ballistics software. The 7.62 NATO just can’t launch the big, high BC bullets fast enough to shoot that flat at that distance. Can’t do it with a .300 Winchester either.