Does anyone have the statistics on riccochet damage during the war?

[Oddball_E8]

It just struck me (not litterally) when testing my new sounds just how dangerous riccochets must have been during WWII...

If you look at this video where I try out some new ppsh-41 sounds, you notice that the unit I'm looking from has some near-misses by riccochets fired from those machinegun units that are pretty far away and with alot of cover between them and the unit.

Is this an accurate portrayal of riccochets?

[Duckman]

I don't know if that kind of detailed statistic exist. I do know that bullet wounds were a minority, so in any case the number of ricochet casualties would probably be fairly small. If you scroll down 4/5 of this page:

http://history.amedd.army.mil/booksdocs/wwii/woundblstcs/chapter1.htm

you'll find statistics from US First and Third Armies. Shrapnel caused 60% of (non-lethal, if I read it correctly) wounds and bullets 25%, with the majority probably coming from machineguns.

(Notice also that the "Other" category is quite significant at 6%.)

[c3k]

That study only denotes those who survived. So, I would contend it illuminates the fact that bullets are more lethal than shrapnel.

It says nothing about how many were killed by any mechanism.

(Reminds of a study during the Civil War about battle casualties. Bayonet wounds were exceedingly rare.)

[JasonC]

Ricochets do a lot less than you might expect because bullets are moving fast enough that the metal they are made from is kind of like jelly if they hit anything solid. The bullet will just go splat, on lots of typical surfaces hard enough to cause a ricochet. I mean, if the surface is not dense the round just goes into it, and if it is dense the round goes smush, splat, breaks into small fragments, etc. You might get a surface cut from a fragment off a shattering bullet, but they aren't staying together at their full fired weight - and they are also moving like only a quarter as fast after leaving a hard surface. Low angle, grazing ricochets can still be dangerous. But the "bullet" that bounces straight off something or nearly so, is still a bullet in name only.

[Collingwood]

Agree with JasonC, unless the angle of ricochet is very shallow they're mostly harmless. I speak from first hand experience, having been hit in the throat by a ricochet. Apart from the surprise of still being alive, no harm done at all. The bullet was completely deformed into a blob.

[giovanni705]

Hi Collingwood

plase tell us more, were you in Iraq?

Giovanni