Hatfield
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Hatfield, thank you so much for this post of yours, above, sharing your knowledge and experience.[/URL]
I noted in the PC by Mr. Martin's family, that he was sitting and may have been shot from the back, as his daughter gestured grabbing her shoulder and leaning forward. They were confused as to the cause of his exclaiming "Ow!" on impact. So, it is possible, the bullet from a high powered rifle didn't go through, so it was either from far off and of not high enough velocity or possible shattered on impact? The other thing that stood out was that she described that her world "cracked". When one hears the crack of a shot, if memory serves me well, in the woods, it can be the echo of a shot not taken from so very far away. A crack as opposed to say a shot in the distance, if I may draw on your experience with this aspect?
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Hello FindHG
IMO
I do think the shot was from quite a ways away.
You are correct that the sounds of bullets going off in the woods can "echo" and can also sometimes make more of a "crack" of a shot sound.
I really wish that camera had did a panaramic view from the campsite to see what their vantage point was. I got a sense that they were able to look down the mountain valley some because the other camper in the 1 video seemed to look around toward the front and their chairs were facing forward.
He said he loved the campsite so I sense it was a great view from where they were.
If the gentleman's chair was turned to his other family members he could have been shot in the back area even if the shot came from down in the valley some.
From all I gathered, I think the people doing the shooting were quite a ways away and they were just terribly careless about not thinking where there bullets were going.
As most people know, bullets can travel over a mile easily but they begin to drop and lose velocity but of course are still very deadly.
If the shooters were futher down in a valley and they were shooting back upwards they may have thought any bullets would just hit the mountainside and they did not realize campers were up in that area.
Im thinking they were about 1/4 mile to 1/2 mile away and it sounds like just a freak accident because the shooters were lawless and careless.
I sure hope the shooters didnt do it on purpose. That would make this much worse situation.
ETA:
One other thing that could have happened is a riccochet off of a rock. Like if the shooters were down at the lake and they hit a rock, then it could have ricocheted upwards towards the campers. Bullets are notorious for ricocheting off of rocks and people need to take great care not to ever shoot at rocks.
ETA again...LOL:
When you do hear shots in the woods, it is very very VERY difficult to figure out which direction it came from. It usually takes multiple shots being fired before someone can begin to tell the direction where it came from.
So it would not surprise me if the campers were not much help to be able to tell LE where they think the shots came from.
LE and park rangers are smart though and they will likely be able to figure out where they think the shooters were. Hopefully they will find recent new shell casings that were left. That will help pin point where the shooters were. Then lets hope there are other witnesses that saw them coming or going.