Interesting video of HMG/Autocannon in action, not for children... Options

[Solstice]

http://www.vetsquad.com/Helicopter_Kills.mpeg

All I can say is: wow. No matter how many times you see this it never loses it's impact.

[Kagetenshi]

Anyone have any insight as to why there was that long a delay before firing commenced?

~J

[Lilt]

The gunfire may have looked slightly more dramatic than it really was due to the thermal imaging. Is it possible that what look like explotions are actually just dust kicked-up by the high-caliber bullet? Having neverlooked through thermal goggles at gunfire I can't really say.

[sidartha]

Those were low light goggles not thermal gogles and so yes what you saw was dust. Did anyone notice the round counter at the bottom right of center? That thing was firing 20 rnds per burst!

[BitBasher]

An object lesson in why you dont piss off someone with a 20mm cannon that can shoot you from a mile aaway and you dont even know they are there.

[Shadow]

Unless they have changed NVG's in the last few years I would say that was thermal. NVG's put a green tint on everything.

As for the video...

An object lesson in why war is the last option.

[TheScamp]

[Crimson Jack]

Very impressive.

[Shadow]

[mfb]

it was thermal. note that the engines on the trucks are warm. also, NVGs present a much higher-quality image. the fact that there are two speakers leads me to believe that this was shot in an Apache--pilots sometimes bring video recorders/cameras with them, and i know Apaches have IR cameras. the reason for the long delay between firing and impact is that the helicopter doing the shooting was a goodly distance away--far enough away that the targets don't even hear the sound of the chopper's engine. they also don't hear the sound of the weapon until a few seconds after the rounds impact, which is why you don't see them trying to get out of the way. if it was an Apache, that's a 30mm cannon that's being fired, and the rounds are--i believe--explosive.

if you listen to the pilots, the reason it took them so long to get shooting initially was that they had to switch from laser distancing to auto distancing. i'm not sure what auto distancing is--maybe determining range based on how far the camera is focusing? regardless, it was important because there's a computer that does their aiming for them (and you thought smartgoggles were sci-fi!); if its range information is wrong, it will shoot too low or too high.

[cykotek]

It actually is IR. If you look to the upper left, you can see the "FLIR" designation. Also, people don't glow like that on image amplification. And the "dust" is also partially hot from the fine red mist of the first target, and the ricochets and sparking from the vehicles that were nearby as well.

[mcb]

http://www.atk.com/productsPrecision/descr...0mmChainGun.htm

I believe that the above was the offending weapon system, 30mm chaingun.

That was a bit grusome. Those poor guys seemed like they couldn't even tell where the rounds were coming from.

It is well that war is so terrible, or we should grow too fond of it.
Robert E. Lee

[Kagetenshi]

Yeah, it was pretty clear that no one had any idea what was happening. The only one to have managed to do anything coherent was the guy who hid behind the truck.

~J

[GunnerJ]

Then you see him rolling over and trying to crawl away...

[kryton]

Would that qualify as a snuff film? Dude that's gruesome. It's like watching a video game where you killing the baddies but freaking people are dying for real. That's one of the things I like about SR when someone dies it's not for real......War really is like a video game, that frightens me......I wonder if skynet is listening? Watching bunkers explode or is cool. Watching someone distentigrate kind of turns my stomach......And I voted Republican last election......uhhhh I need some beer.

[FlakJacket]

[kryton]

On a side note I work with a guy who use to maintain the electronics on a apache. He was saying that when they fire the large caliber guns like that that they have to fire continuously or else they damage the internal mechanisms. Down in North Carolina they would "fix" some of the piolts who had a propensity for firing short bursts. They would load the amunition belts with a round every other bullet. None of the pilots caught on. After watching that clip I see why he's so against going into Iraq. We never actually see any one dying. When you see that sort thing in RL up front and personal war takes on a different dimension. I give those guys over there alot of respect, that's got to be something that haunts you till you die.

[kryton]

What you don't see you don't normally think about it. (Out of sight out of mind.) Just like the road to Bagdad....That bacame a death field. That sort of footage is ussually "edited". That can't be good.

I wonder if they develop these weapon systems with the idea that they want you to fire and forget. Being ordered to kill someone can never be easy. But pointing a cross hair on a red blip is alot easier than seeing someone's head explode. Snipers in Vietnam were close enough not only to see their prey but hear the noises they make when certain parts get "impacted". There's a guy I knew in the early 90's who will never leave Vietnam and can explain in detail what someone's head sounds like when it takes a round.

[Shadow]

[Shadow]

I would also guess from the way those rounds tore through the trucks that they were depleted uranium, but that's just a guess.

[Kagetenshi]

Given that they were ordinary trucks, they wouldn't have to be DU rounds. HMG round'd do just fine.

~J

[FlakJacket]

That's no Heavy Machine Gun. I figure something like a .50 BMG is what sort of caliber a HMG has. For 30mm canons you're way into Autocanon territory by then.

[Kagetenshi]

I said that HMG rounds'd do fine, which they would. So would miniguns and MMG, probably. Autocannons'd have no need in the least for DU.

And yes, I did misidentify, but don't you love it when a flawed observation yields a correct conclusion? ;)

~J

[Raptor1033]

whatever it is they're using it almost looks like a dual mount system. i swear when they're taking out the first guy i see 2 bullet trails

[sidartha]