Things I learned at the forensics workshop: Ballistics a couple of weeks ago…
Instructor Chris Mathieson had to wear white gloves when handling the guns. And no, we were not allowed to touch the guns.
* Ballistics is the study of projectiles. Our instructor Chris had us throwing rubber balls the size of gumdrops, across the room and trying to land them in a plastic cup to illustrate trajectory and drag.
* Ballistic fingerprinting is the studies of marks left on the bullet after being fired from a gun.
* Rifling is what’s happening when the grooves inside a gun’s barrel helps to spin a bullet out for accuracy and range. This is where the word rifle comes from.
* The rifling in gun manufacturers differ in the shape of grooves, twist and directions.
* The grooves on a bullet after it’s been fired is called striations. These marks can be matched with the gun it was fired from.
* The marks on a cartridge casing after being fired are called breech markings.
The photos on the left matches up breech markings
* No two firearm, even if they are the same make & model, produces the same marks on the bullets and casings
* If you fire a gun into the water, (like they do in Hollywood action movies) the bullet would travel as far as eight feet; being slowed down considerably by the water. This led us to talk about that Mythbusters episode on Bulletproof Water:
Confirmed: you can protect yourself from a bullet by diving underwater. If the shooter were directly overhead, you would probably be safe from most guns at 8 ft. at a 30 degree angle, you would only have to be 3 ft underwater to be safe.
Good to know.
Even better to make note of was when Chris told us that the ballistics department at the cop shop located next door has 5,000 firearms in their storage. Along with bullets for those guns. AND that the cop shop, and in particular, the ballistics department is the most heavily fortified place in the entire city.
Especially good to know if the zombie apocalypse ever comes our way.
For more pics, check out my Flickr album.
2 Comments
Thanks for the tip about the water… seriously! You never know… 😉
@ dave. i love little factoids like that. because, like you said, you never know.