UKC

Ukraine claims sniper has broken record for second-longest ranged kill https://mol.im/a/11425645 via https://dailym.ai/android

No wonder Putin's reluctant to leave the Kremlin

No doubt a piece of soldiering skill but the idea of a kind of Guinness World Record for snipers is rather distasteful. 

Possibly. It strikes me as in a similar vein to the symbols that fighter pilots put on the side of their plane to denote enemy kills. If sniping is a profession then it must have its professionals and ranks. A few years ago I read the book written by the Brit who currently holds second place. I wonder how they verify claims?

I think either the spotter does or post battlefield assessment of the corpse is still around.

Do you think he deserves a medal?

Good on him, I say.  If some **** hadn't invaded his country, killing over 100,000 of his fellow citizens, the matter wouldn't have arisen.

2710 metres? By my estimate that's about 450 times as long as one of Putin's tables.

You can see why the Ukrainians would air the story: promote pride in their own forces and fear amongst the Russian forces.

Meanwhile, Wagner Group have just released their own promotion video, also aimed at promoting fear, but in their own side rather than amongst the enemy: it shows one of their mercenaries (convicted murderer recruited from prison) newly recaptured after defection to Ukrainian forces. He's shown with his head taped to a brick wall giving what sounds like a scripted confession explaining how he swapped sides, next thing a man with a sledgehammer steps into frame and murders him.

Not hard to work out who the bad guys are in this particular conflict.

All murder is vile. War is obviously a different environment, but the ruthless killing of another in the ways described is utterly loathsome, and cruel, even to someone who is guilty of murder themselves. Death in the heat of battle is somewhat different, but restraining someone in order to kill them in the way described is something else of an altogether higher order of hellishness.

Utterly bestial murder up there with the worst ISIS atrocities but while ISIS sought to legitimise their actions as adhering to standards set out millennia ago, Russia has no such excuse, claiming as it does (laughably), the status of a modern democracy. it's deeply troubling that this was sanctioned from the top.  

Yevgeny Prigozhin, chief of Wagner Group, claimed responsibility for his killing saying that it was "dog's death for the dog".

Apparently the Wagner groups emblem is a sledge hammer. Both as an analogy, smashing through enemy lines and literal, as used against people.

It cant be a great recruiting tool to show the brutal murder of your own team. Especially, as they are dredging prisons for recruits. The fact that their boss defended the action, rather that saying it was a rogue element, speaks volumes.

I wonder how the Ukrainians will handle deserters, now they know what fate awaits them. Equally, I wonder if it will discourage deserters, or motivate them to get away at any cost.

I Think the Canadian who has the longest range kill (3.4km?) bullet took 7 seconds to reach it's target.

Given that the fired bullet falls at the same rate as if it was dropped next to the muzzle, now imagine dropping the bullet down the center of a stairwell. How high would you be for the bullet to take 7 seconds to fall to the floor ? 

According to this https://www.omnicalculator.com/physics/free-fall 240 metres . So I am assuming the gun is actually pointing 240m above the targets head!!

And you've seen this?!? I would be really careful about watching such things, post ISIS, snuff films like that besides being horrific may well break anti-terrorism legislation. 

Also don't forget the windage..

Edit. I'm unsure of the veracity of this (Ukrainian sniper) story. The video posted in the original link can't be actual footage of the shot. The flight time is all wrong for a shot over that distance. It may well be true, but that footage isn't it.

No, I've not seen this. Read the report on the BBC. I don't tend to seek out extra horrific crap to carry around in my head. 

I made that mistake typing  "Ukraine war" in the search engine of twitter a month or so ago - and seeing gopro footage of a soldier being riddled with bullets as he left an outside toilet.

Always a mistake to watch these things. Hard to shake the image and find yourself thinking about it days later at random times. Not cool

Just reading about it is haunting me. absolutely horrific.

Don't forget the spinning of the earth in your calculations.

Here’s an example of error due to the Coriolis effect: firing the same .308 175gr bullet at 2700fps muzzle velocity, from a latitude of 45° in the Northern Hemisphere, the deflection at 1000yds will be of 3in to right.

https://thearmsguide.com/5329/external-ballistics-the-coriolis-effect-6-the...

I think that explains why my .177 airgun shots are all 3 inches off target at 10m. Lighter and slower projectile, cant compete with gravity and Coriolis.

Is that right? Surely it would be impossible to hit a person if you had to aim 240m higher, or even 24m. There must be more to the physics.

The toilet guy footage was brutal, though there was no blood visible, which makes me wonder if it was staged. There’s certainly a lot of footage around, more or less graphic. I gather there are some Telegram channels dedicated to this stuff. Should it be moderated? I’m not sure. It’s the reality of war and there is no point hiding it (I mean combat footage, not executions - though if war crimes are filmed, that’s probably helpful for potential prosecutions). As you say, you don’t need to watch it if you don’t want to. Some is just funny, like the Russian tank racing away, shedding soldiers sitting on it as it went, then crashing into a tree, set to a Benny Hill soundtrack. At least I thought it was funny… the soldiers probably didn’t but they shouldn’t have been there in the first place. 

And you need to know the Ballistic Coefficient of the bullet and whether it is going transonic (and how it reacts if it does) amongst the mundane stuff like air pressure and humidity/density.

The record hit (on a larger target) with a rifle is 7081m.

All the kudos goes to the person holding the gun but the spotter deserves some credit as well. I did sniper training many years ago.  There was never a single individual we always went out in pairs and indeed the most experienced shooter would typically be the spotter.

You have to adjust the sights to offset it. Hence why on old iron sights you have different peepholes on the rear sight for different distances.

I guess you might run out though at stupidly long ranges and then manually have to offset it.

The sniper will know the range from their rangefinder, and will have an app or book that gives them ballistic calculations so he can set the compensation on his sights accordingly.  240m @3.4km means the aiming point is only just over 4degrees above the target.

Timing has to be taken into account. It takes time to measure all the variables and "dial in" the scope.  If the target was moving there may not be time so the shooter has to anticipate direction and elevation and compensate manually by "holding over" and perhaps aiming to one side. If all the variables have been dialled in and the target does not move the cross hairs are centred on the target when the shot is taken. I think even the best shots would admit that there is also an element of luck involved.

What speed is the bullet traveling at, after 7km of deceleration? And also, at what distance is the bullet traveling at a "sub lethal" speed (assuming it's fired horizontally)? or would it just fall to earth?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/External_ballistics

There is a whole section on this very topic...(I am no expert though and expect a UKC member to come in and explain it far better than I have)

There is more to it than that and a lot more variables.  There used to be tables but software is used which gives the added advantage of a visual representation.  These days I have to satisfy myself with air rifles but the principles are the same.  I use a program called ChairGun (It's worth downloading to play with if you are really interested)which shows the trajectory of any given projectile based on weight, size etc. etc. There are also instruments that show the energy of the projectile at the point at which it is measured.

689fps/210mps, hit in the wrong place that's undoubtedly lethal considering it's a moderately large calibre. Something like a Walther PPK has a muzzle velocity of 305fps.

The interesting question is whether these records for snipers are actually already consigned to history but nothing has been made public, the trials of EXACTO ammunition were publicised some years ago and whether they are in the field with US special forces nobody is saying. That's a laser-guided .50 cal bullet with probably 10km range.

I spent a while reading a manual of Roman military law in the stacks of Durham University library many years ago and I seem to remember a punishment like this being due for being absent from post during sentry duty.  To be administered by your own comrades after you are buried up to your neck.

The Romans were rather keen on brutal punishments.

On several occasions where a unit broke in battle they went in for decimation. With groups of ten (varied to some degree) picking lots for one of them to beaten to death by the other nine.

I was reading an article on sniper rifles yesterday - and it mentioned something I hadn't considered - the new longer range rifles being produced are not that popular with special forces because the extra range is not that useful in most combat situations. Also they can be heavy and cumbersome.

I thought it would be nearer 1000 fps.  305 fps sounds more like the air pistol version.

PPKs are .32 ACP, so around 900fps.

Correct, it's mps.

I can't comprehend holding over/under at those sort of ranges, it must be fractions of a Mil at that distance?

"Out Of Nowhere -  A history of Military Snipers, from the sharpshooter to Afghanistan by Martin Pegler, 2004

Interestingly the Russians were quite happy to use female snipers in WW2 and some of these achieved the record number of kills:-

Lyudmila Pavlichenko = 309 confirmed kills

Maria Morozova = 192.

Mariya Plivanona & Natalya Koshova both with over 300 kills, before their position was overun by Germans and  blew themselves up as the  Germans entered their position killing themselves and the German soldiers.

I remember watching a TV  interview with, I think, Lyudmila and Maria about their WW2 experiences.  Both were then (late 1980s?)  grandmothers.  I remember the interviewer asking one of them if she ever felt remorse or regret over her kills.  She instantly said, "No, they were invading our country and I was defending it".

Both sides in this war have mass conscription. Though no doubt some deserve to die the deaths mostly depress me.