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a revelation was discovered

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spacemanspiff

Senior Member
Joined
Dec 24, 2002
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Location
alaska
Sunday morning, 4:00 am.
I spent the previous evening and into the wee hours playing MOHAA and watching movies at the office. I'm walking home (down Minnesota for you anchoragites). I pass 36th Avenue and the thought enters my head as I watch a car pull down an alley "If I had to use my weapon right here, I bet it would wake up my mother". I grew up just two blocks from Minnesota & 36th.
I walk past the Spenard intersection and am walking through the lot of Williams Express.
BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! - to my left and forward....
***hiiissssssssssssss****
CRACK! CRACK! CRACK! - behind me and to my right....

voice in my head "what the hell??? don't just stand there, RUN!"
i duck behind a pillar of the gas pumps.
voice in my head "dummy! that isnt cover!"
i run to the building and into the shadows. now my heart is pounding and the muscles in my low back are cramping, as they always do when i am faced with a high stress situation. no more shots have been fired, so i circle the building and head into the Willams to see if they have called 911 yet. a cab driver is on his cell phone with the dispatcher.
police cars flood the area, no sirens or lights, but circle each block for ten minutes, until i flag one down and tell them where i heard the shots coming from. apparently noone knew exactly where to be looking.

my revelation? i dont like hearing the *hissss* of rounds fired.
 
My life is never that exciting. My wife accuses me of driving around on empty just so that there will be some risk and chance of adventure in my life.

There are many quotes (most from wartime) relating to that hissing sound. Something about never being so alive as when you almost die, but don't.
 
Hey Spiff-

My son was across Spenard from you at the time. He was at work and happened to be outside. Described bullets wizzing past his head too! Glad everyone is safe! He said a lot of police started checking out the motel across Minnesota.
 
Were you armed?

I think you did exactly right seeking cover first, but I think I'd have drawn my weapon in case any rats came my way. Tough call though... a cop seeing you with a drawn weapon would surely reach the wrong conclusion!

Keith
 
HB,
"There is nothing more exhilarating than to be shot at without result."
-Winston Churchill

Spiff,
Glad you're not telliing us that your revelation was that you don't like bullets passing through your body.

hissssCRACK is diconcerting enough.
 
Wow! Glad both you and Biff's son are OK.

I've driven through that intersection thousands of times...it's the main route I take to get into town. I also fuel at the Chevron station just across the intersection from Williams. Of all places I visit in Anchorage, it's where I'm most aware of what's going on around me.

Were you headed west or south through the Williams lot?

Good job staying alive...

[edited to get my directions straight...]
 
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hell yeah i was armed! i didnt think about it until i made my way behind the building, but i decided it wasnt a good idea to make it visible in dark shadows with police minutes away from responding.
my Sit-Aw was already lit up, especially because of the hour, i know because i consciously thought about crossing minnesota earlier than i did, but theres better light on the east side of the street. i notice cars in the area, where they turn off, i looked for other people walking, its just how i walk. a car had just parked in front of the pizza hut in the williams, and two people were walking inside. they hesitated momentarily, and then laughed before going in.
i was approaching williams heading south, and the next day i went back and tried to determine where exactly those shots could have come from, and it had to be from the hotel or from a vehicle passing in front of it. at that distance, i doubt a shooter could have seen me what with the small trees/bushes that are around williams.

biff, does your son work at that rental car? if so, i talked to him briefly, asked him if he heard the rounds hitting the building or cars, it sounded similar to when metal plates are hit at the firing range, and the car rental building has a wood siding, leading me to believe the rounds hit a car.


i have a theory, since i didnt hear a 'snap', i assume the rounds were sub-sonic, probably .45, as 9mm is usually supersonic, right? if so, just how close would a round be to hear it 'hissss'? whats the maximum distance for that to be heard?
 
...just how close would a round be to hear it 'hissss'? whats the maximum distance for that to be heard
Click to expand...
I don't actually know the answer but my guess is that it is close, or in other words, you probably don't want to know.
 
Spiff-

That was my son you were talking to. He thought you worked at the gas station, but he almost quoted you as far as what you asked him.

I asked him if he got down behind a car - he said no, it was over with so fast, and he was tryin to figure out where the shot came from. Gotta get the boy to the range. Who would figure you'd have to train reaction to contact drills (ambush response) to live in Anchorage?

Two possibilities as to what was being fired - subsonic, i.e. .45 ACP or 147 grain 9mm, other possibility that the shots were fired close enough (25 yards or less) that the sonic crack and the cartridge boom blended together.
 
Small world!

I was there too! I was over at the hotel shooting rats off the dumpster from my window when all hell broke loose! I don't know how you guys live in the big city with all that violence...

Keith
 
Geez Keith, don't you remember the rule? "Know your target and what is beyond it? :D

Glad everything worked out for everybody.

I play a lot of paintball, and although it isn't EXACTLY the same, it's still pretty intense to have paintballs whiz around your head at 285 fps. Pretty exciting, and a bit safer than the mean streets of Alaska :neener:
 
Geez Keith, don't you remember the rule? "Know your target and what is beyond it?
Click to expand...

Well, it was 4am, what kind of knucklehead would be out in the Spenard neighborhood at that time of night?
 
well thanks to keith the spenard whores all scattered, leaving dozens of men even more lonely and desperate. probably didnt make enough to pay rent, so now they're probably homeless.
hope you're happy keith! :D
 
I doubt you can tell the caliber of the bullets zipping by your head by the sound they make.

A rifle round will sound like a bumble bee as it reaches long range, thats the noise of the rear of the bullet cavitating and "popping" the air around it. At close range all you hear is ZING then you hear the BANG.

Or another way to look at it:

if it hits you before you hear the bang it was supersonic. If you hear the bang before it was subsonic. You can hear it go ZING in either case and sound travels in strange manners, esp in an urban setting.

Glad you are ok.
 
well thanks to keith the spenard whores all scattered, leaving dozens of men even more lonely and desperate
Click to expand...

Maybe that "whizzing" noise you heard was the sound of dozens of zippers coming up at emergency speed?

Keith
 
no one hit.
for the sake of my mother, i didnt tell her about it. i asked if she heard any shots and she didnt so i left it at that. even if she had heard them it wouldnt do any good for her to know the exact details. she knows the neighborhood is dangerous and she agrees that its only common sense that i carry, but shes got enough to worry about with her grandkids.

here in spenard, gunshots are not uncommon.
 
I don't wish the sound of bang-hiiissss-crack on anyone. I about crapped my pants when it happened to me. I was returning a 1.5 and a 3 year old that I had babysat that night to their Mom.

Very icky sound I don't want to hear again. Glad you're ok.
 
The only times I've heard a bullet go by was when I was working the target pit.

I'm not sorry for that.
 
"Maybe that "whizzing" noise you heard was the sound of dozens of zippers coming up at emergency speed?"

LOL :D
 
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