A bystander at a gun show in Hollidaysburg PA was gunned down accidentally by a Gatling-style "minigun" last night.  The gun was mounted on the back of a civilian Hummer.

While called a "minigun", this firearm puts our "Maxi" power, its six barrels unleasjhing lead at the rate of 3600 rounds per minute.  :o

The guy who got shot was, oddly enough, the guy who was operating it.  If you've ever seen a minigun that is a pretty hard thing to do.

Nevertheless, that's gotta hurt.  :-\\

could you give a link? i'm having a hard time figuring out what happened.

could you give a link? i'm having a hard time figuring out what happened.


Go to Yahoo! News and do a search on "Gatling".

None of the news stories give much in the way of details though...

Here's one article:

http://www.charlotte.com/nation/story/276839.html

The only way I see that this gun could have unintentionally fired was "cook off", in which a chambered round auto ignites due to the temperature of the weapon. A minigun would certainly generate very high temperatures in a short amount of time, and any rounds left in the barrels or receiver would be in danger of spontaneously firing.

Regardless, this officer broke the first rule of gun safety:

"1. ALWAYS keep the gun pointed in a safe direction.
This is the primary rule of gun safety. A safe direction means that the gun is pointed so that even if it were to go off it would not cause injury or damage."

And paid for that mistake with his life.

Ant

Regardless, this officer broke the first rule of gun safety:



Broke it six times if you think about it.

Who sticks their head in front of a minigun?  Geeze Louise...

Who sticks their head in front of a minigun?  Geeze Louise...


Obviously, a guy with no brains.

And who in their right mind stands in front of a minigun? 

Right.  A guy with no guts.

Obviously, a guy with no brains.

And who in their right mind stands in front of a minigun? 

Right.  A guy with no guts.


Well, you know what they say: "No guts, no gory!"

Ant

could you give a link? i'm having a hard time figuring out what happened.


Hit up Youtube and look around for pictures of an A-10 "Warthog".  It's the best tank-killing aircraft devised by man... mainly because of this gun.  The gun is powerful enough that, if fired for too long, will cause the aircraft to lose airspeed and stall.

If you remember the scene in Terminator 2 where the Governator unloads with that 6-barrel gatling gun onto the entire LAPD... keep in mind that if the gun had been real (and a T-800 Model 101 had been heavy enough not to be thrown backwards several hundred feet by the recoil), the humans hiding behind the police cars would have been turned into a fine pink mist.

If you remember Gulf War I (that's the one we got to win :), and the "Highway of Death".  A-10s did that.  (There's probably footage on YouTube of that, too.)

A GE minigun is maximum thrash.  It's the firearms equivalent to Ministry's Stigmata, the live version from In Case You Didn't Feel Like Showing Up, all nine minutes of it.  It's the closest thing to Douglas' Adams' ficticious Sirius Cybernetics Corporation's Kill-o-Zap, in that it not only has a right side and a wrong side, but that it's designer went gleefully over-the-top in making it blatantly obvious which side of the gun was the side you do not want to be on. And I'm understating things here -- to a degree comparable to describing the Grand Canyon as a ditch.  Words really don't quite do the thing justice. 

If you remember the scene in Terminator 2 where the Governator unloads with that 6-barrel gatling gun onto the entire LAPD... keep in mind that if the gun had been real (and a T-800 Model 101 had been heavy enough not to be thrown backwards several hundred feet by the recoil), the humans hiding behind the police cars would have been turned into a fine pink mist.



I remember the scene. You exaggerate about its recoil, though the "fine pink mist" is accurate (maybe "reddish mist with random chunks" would be more accurate....)



A GE minigun is maximum thrash/// Words really don't quite do the thing justice. 


No, they don't: neither do YouTube videos of the big brother of the GE Minigun, the 20mm CIWS (Close In Weapons System).

Here's a test of the 20mm gun that shows the loading. If you turn your stereo all the way up, then you'll know about how loud it is... halfway anyway:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sALiuWg_I1k&mode=related&search=

The noise is like a lawnmower on meth, crack and steroids (or 120 octane gasoline, 15:1 compression and no mufflers)

Here's a video that shows what even a 'lowly' 30 cal can do:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HoPq8QceeZA&mode=related&search=

Looks like he's using API and tracer rounds there...

Ant

IIRC, under a sustained burst, a minigun has a recoil reaction force of something like 600 pounds.  :o  Remember it can fire at 3600 rounds per minute or 60 PER SECOND.  That creates some nasty recoil.

If Ahnold had been firing a mini like he was in the movies, he'd be firing towarsd the sky 'cause the thing would knocked him on his butt.  ;D

Now, the gun in an A-10 Warthog is, if I recall specs correctly, a 20millimeter weapon and not a 7.62millimeter gun with which the chap in Hollidaysburg had his unfortunate mishap.  The A-10 was actually an attack aircraft desiged AROUND that gun, for close ground support.