Sniper firing range. Russian sniper sets a precision shooting range record
Many people underestimate the work of a sniper, however, in fact, he is faced with some of the most difficult tasks during combat operations. In difficult conditions, you have to hunt down a target for a long time without giving away your location to the enemy. In addition, you have to shoot from a long distance, which only the best of the best can do. It is about the best snipers who managed to hit the target from the longest distances that we will talk further.
Christopher Reynolds
Distance: 1,852 meters
The most accurate shot was fired by British sniper Christopher Reynolds. His target was a field commander nicknamed "Mullah", who took responsibility for several recent terrorist attacks in the region. Reynolds destroyed the commander with one flick of his finger, for which he received a medal from the hands of the Queen of England herself.
Sniper South Africa
Distance: 2,124 meters
One of the snipers of the regular army of South Africa (the name of the fighter is classified) achieved amazing results: over the course of several days, the soldier “shot” 5-6 rebels of the M23 group - all at a distance of about two kilometers.
Carlos Hatchcock
Distance: 2,286 meters
In 1967, Gunnery Sergeant Carlos Hatchcock set a very unusual record: instead of a sniper rifle, this master used an M2 .50 Browning machine gun, equipped, for fun, with an optical sight. Carlos managed to shoot a Viet Cong at a distance of more than two kilometers, which to this day remains a record for automatic weapons.
Brian Kremer
Distance: 2,285 meters
Sergeant Brian Cramer was deployed to Iraq with the 2nd US Ranger Battalion. The mission of this detachment is still classified - it is only known that the shot from sniper Kremer brought him fame as the best shooter of the entire operation.
Arron Perry
Distance: 2,413 meters
Another Canadian sniper also distinguished himself in Operation Anaconda. Arron Perry managed to shoot an Afghan with an RPG at a distance of more than two kilometers, and Perry pulled the trigger, guided only by the random reflection of the sun on the enemy gun.
Bruno Turcotte
Distance: 2,414 meters
Bruno Turcotte was part of a group of Canadian peacekeepers conducting an operation on the dangerous Afghan slopes. His shot saved an entire detachment of American infantrymen: the soldiers were climbing the mountain and did not see the machine gunner, who was already ready to open fire. Bruno's lightning-fast reaction earned him the rank of master corporal.
Corporal Harrison
Distance: 2,462 meters
A British sniper, Corporal Horse Craig Harrison, served in an infantry support unit. The battle that took place in November 2009 made this brave guy a real legend among his colleagues. Harrison managed to neutralize the driver, shooter and passenger of an Afghan pickup truck equipped with a machine gun with three shots. Three out of three are at a distance of almost two and a half kilometers.
This story began several years ago, when Russian shooter and manufacturer of high-precision long-range rifles Vlad Lobaev saw a video on YouTube where cheerful old men from Texas hit a target with a rifle at a distance of 3,600 yards (3,292 m). Vlad decided to take on the challenge and compete with the Americans. Fortunately, he had his own weapons factory, Lobaev Arms, at hand.
The best from PM for Defender of the Fatherland Day
The Americans fired from a custom-made ultra-long-range rifle of rare caliber .375 CheyTac. By that time, Lobaev’s company was already mass-producing the ultra-long-range rifle SVLK-14 “Twilight” in an even rarer and more powerful .408 CheyTac caliber, which allows sniper shooting at distances of over 2 km. For the record, they took a special custom “Twilight” with a titanium chassis and firing pin, with a barrel length of 720 mm and a weight of more than 9 kg. In April 2015, on a field in the Kaluga region (there are simply no multi-kilometer shooting ranges in Russia), with this rifle, Lobaev’s team, after sighting shots, hit a target at a distance of 3400 m. The video with the record was posted on YouTube. The Americans reacted calmly: they say, okay, let's continue the duel in absentia.
Record rifle SVLK-14 “Twilight”
Subsonic
Not only the Americans reacted: a French sniper from the Foreign Legion, after long training, hit a target at a distance of 3600 m, but, apart from an article in a small specialized magazine, there is no information about this record, no one posted videos. The Americans also crossed the mark, first 3600 and then 4000 yards (3657 m). Lobaev’s company studied this video almost under a microscope: some parameters of the shot did not match, the flight time did not match up with the initial speed and angle of inclination of the bar. Nothing has changed in ballistics, but several hundred meters have been added. This does not happen, but since the competition was originally conceived as a competition of gentlemen, the Lobaevites decided to continue to shoot fairly with the Americans. And win by knockout - hit from four kilometers away.
Ultra-long-range shooting for shooters is considered to be shooting at a distance where at the end of the trajectory the bullet travels at deep subsonic levels, because with supersonic everything is clear - there ballistics are calculated easily, using simple mathematical methods. But subsonic ballistics is considered more difficult, and what is most unpleasant is that in this mode some physical processes occur that make it difficult to shoot at ultra-long distances. Firstly, a re-stabilization effect occurs. The linear speed slows down per 1000 m, say, three times - from 900 m/s to 300 m/s. And the bullet rotation speed is only 5-10%. At subsonic speeds the speed is even lower, but the rotation speed is still the same. This leads to the fact that all the design and manufacturing defects of the bullet begin to come out, which greatly affects the dispersion. In addition, at low speeds, errors in assessing wind and weather conditions become noticeable. The second factor is turbulence in the bottom part at deep subsonic levels. At speeds slightly less than 300 m/s this is not critical, but at ranges of more than 2 km it greatly affects accuracy. There is only one way to combat these phenomena - to develop a bullet design with a different bottom design.
Classic problems for ultra-long range shooting require increased bullet weight and improved aerodynamics. Lobaev set his first record with a standard D27 bullet, an analogue of the Lost River, widely known in the West. These are elongated, solidly turned bullets for long-range shooting, also called Ultra VLD. They were no longer suitable for new records. If you follow the path of increasing the mass of the bullet, you will need to change the entire cartridge - either increase the chamber or use a new progressively burning powder, or even switch to a different caliber. Another caliber (Browning .50 or domestic 12.7 x 108 mm) is a transition to another class and a completely different weapon with all the ensuing consequences: other barrels, bolts, receivers, dimensions, weight and a significant increase in recoil, at which There is no longer any question of pleasure from shooting.
Lobaev decided not to deviate from the old cartridge case and caliber .408 CheyTac, not to change either the dimensions or weight of the weapon. He was able to develop a heavier 30 gram D30 bullet while staying within the standard cartridge. This was also done because the cartridge is quite accessible and anyone can try to repeat the achievement. The design of the bullet was also modified: it began to resemble a long elongated spindle with two pointed ends, which made it possible to achieve an almost ideal ballistic coefficient of one. This required a change in the rifle's design, with a faster rifling pitch to stabilize the longer, heavier bullet. If the classic rifling pitch in the 408 caliber is thirteen, then Lobaev decided to use ten on the record-breaking rifle. Despite the fact that the initial speed of the new bullet was lower (875 m/s for the D30 versus 935 m/s for the D27), it had a flatter trajectory at 2 km.
Lateral support
One of the main problems with record shooting is that you can't keep raising the scope bar indefinitely. When shooting at such distances, the rifle has large elevation angles, as when shooting overhead, almost like a howitzer. At the top point of the trajectory, the bullet travels at an altitude of several hundred meters. No scopes allow such adjustments for aiming, so for record shooting they use special rails for the scope. However, you cannot endlessly raise the bar: the muzzle device begins to block the aiming line. This is exactly what confused Lobaev in the last American record: the angle of inclination of the bar did not correspond to the correction required for such a distance. Lobaev spotted a solution to this problem at the artillery, where the sight had long been moved to the left of the barrel. The solution is simple, but no one in the world has used it before Lobaev. If you look closely at the photo, you can see that the sight on Lobaev’s record-breaking rifles runs to the left of the barrel. Which turned out to be more convenient for shooting: you don’t need to throw your head back and you can take the optimal position.
Lobaev's know-how is the side mount of the sight for ultra-long-range shooting. A year ago it was forbidden to even photograph it. This system can also be used by troops: when shooting at long distances, it helps to get by with available Russian sights.
On the second try
They were going to break the record last summer in the fields near Krasnodar. For this purpose, a giant target measuring 10 x 10 m was made in order to at least take aim. No one knew how a bullet behaved at such distances, and there were no precise mathematical models. It was only clear that the bullets would enter the ground in the target area almost vertically, so the target was positioned at a large angle. Another difficulty was that the soil was wet during the shooting, so it was necessary to hit the target exactly: traces of hitting the ground at such low speeds and almost vertical angles are not visible. Unfortunately for the entire team, the record failed the first time: they failed to hit even such a large target. While they were preparing for the next round, the Americans posted a video on the Internet with a 4 km record. It became clear that we needed to shoot even further.
For the past year, Lobaev and his team have been conjuring their magic on the rifle and new bullets, practically not giving out information about the project, fearing to jinx the world record, constantly approaching the cherished milestone, first taking 4170 m, then 4200. And in October of this year they succeeded in the incredible: famous shooter and promoter Andrei Ryabinsky hit a target measuring 1 x 1 m from a distance of 4210 m. For such a shot, it was necessary to take into account a huge number of factors, including the rotation of the Earth - the bullet spent 13 seconds in the air! As the record holder himself said, it took him eight years to achieve this shot. So now the ball is in American territory. Or, more correctly, a bullet.
The experiment was carried out on agricultural fields in the Kaluga region.
The world record was set by Russian snipers who hit a target located almost three and a half kilometers away from the firing position. The incredible result is now being called a new victory for domestic weapons and they are even going to submit an application to the Guinness Book of Records. Our field shooting masters beat the previous group record by 100 meters, and the professional sniper record by more than one thousand.
The fire experiment took place on the border of the Kaluga and Tula regions near the regional center of Tarusa. It was here that sniper Vladislav Lobaev, together with his team, decided to carry out an ambitious task - to break the world record in rifle shooting.
This is an exclusive shooting - of a record nature. This is not group shooting - this is shooting to hit, at least one shot,” says Vladislav Lobaev, designer of sniper rifles.
By the way, Vladislav Lobaev himself is an athlete and enjoys long-range shooting. In addition, Lobaev developed the latest sniper rifle, which now bears his name. Several years ago, a man created the first private company in Russia for the serial production of high-precision weapons. After many achievements in the development of weapons, Vlad, one might say, was forced to set a new record - already in sniper business - by the Americans.
We are talking about a video that appeared on the Internet in which four foreign cowboys of advanced age hit a target at a distance of 30 football fields - that's about three thousand three hundred meters. Among domestic masters, the foreign experiment aroused suspicion and turned into a challenge.
Already here, in Russia, a distance of three thousand four hundred meters is a hundred more than that of the Americans. In other words, the territory for the experiment is comparable to 32 football fields according to FIFA standards. Or a little less than any runway at Domodedovo Airport. And in Moscow itself, this is almost the same distance as from Manezhnaya Square to the Belorussky Station - the entire Tverskaya Street. A rangefinder helped to navigate the countryside. It was with his help that points for the sniper and targets were chosen in the fields.
The main condition of the experiment is the absence of obstacles at the entire distance. Only the field in the Kaluga region turned out to be like this. The target was set three agricultural fields from the firing position. The participants had to get here through plowed soil and mud.
The target itself measures one meter by one meter. The shield was dug right into the remains of last year's hay.
Mission Impossible. 3400 - simply no one has done it. If this happens, it will be a world record,” says Sergei Parfenov, master of sports in bullet shooting.
In Vladislav’s hands was a complex rifle, the likes of which have no analogues in the world. The sniper created the weapon with his own hands. In total, the athlete has six different models in his weapon range. By the way, this sniper rifle is called “Twilight”. Its caliber is 408 Chey Tac, muzzle velocity is 900 meters per second, length is 1430 millimeters, barrel length is 780 millimeters, weight is more than nine and a half kilograms.
True, to achieve the record, in order to increase the range, the weapon had to be modified: the bar for the sight was increased, the rear part of the barrel was moved higher. In addition, even the bullets had to be loaded with special ones - with a pointed tip that, like lightning, cuts through the air.
The first few shots were encouraging - although they didn’t hit the target, they definitely caught up with the Americans. And in order to overtake, it seems that all the conditions at the shooting range coincided - sunny weather and even the wind subsides from time to time. After some time, the bullet still pierced the target.
According to Vlad Lobaev, this result is still better than the American one and is worthy even of the Guinness Book of Records. Note that the previous record was set in Afghanistan by professional British military sniper Craig Garrison. In 2010, using an L115A3 Long Range Rifle of 8.59 mm caliber, which has a standard firing range of about 1,100 meters, he hit a target located at a distance of 2.47 kilometers.
What can one shot do? Eliminate the person. Change history. Stop the enemy's advance. Save a platoon of comrades in arms. Professionals in their field always deserve respectful treatment among people in their specialty. Army snipers are no exception; the fate of the entire operation often depends on the accuracy of their fire.
1. From a machine gun for two kilometers
When Carlos Hascock was a child, he loved to hunt small birds and squirrels with a small-caliber rifle. Hascock's talent for shooting was discovered by his service in the US Marine Corps. The young man was sent to Vietnam. The enemies appreciated the sniper's skills faster than the American command, setting a price of 30 thousand dollars for the sniper's head (a colossal amount at that time).
On missions, the American used a Winchester Model 70 rifle. However, he set his main record using an M2 Browning heavy machine gun with an 8X Unertl optical sight mounted on a makeshift bracket. Hascock "picked up" an enemy courier at a range of 2,300 meters. This record was considered a world record from 1967 to 2002.
2. One bullet kills six
The identity of this shooter is kept secret by the American command. All that is known is that he serves as a corporal in the 1st Battalion Coldstream Guards. At the time of the record shot, the soldier was only 20 years old.
In the unit, the corporal very quickly established himself as an excellent marksman, and therefore was the first to gain access to the high-quality sniper rifle L115A3 AWM .338 caliber. In Afghanistan, a fighter killed a Taliban machine gunner with a hit to the chest at a distance of 1339 meters.
The corporal made his most striking shot in the province of Helmund, when he was covering the positions of the British who were attacked by the Taliban. Six militants, including a suicide bomber, were approaching the Allied trench. The corporal shot at the last one and caused the vest to explode, killing all six. The shot was fired from a distance of 850 meters.
3. 10 seconds flight
The record for the longest shot was set by an “unnamed” sniper of the Coalition troops during an operation against terrorists of a group now banned in Russia. A soldier of the 2nd Joint Task Force, using a McMillan TAC-50 rifle, effectively disrupted the entire militant offensive with one shot, killing the commander at the position of Iraqi soldiers at a distance of 3,450 meters. The bullet flew to the target for 10 seconds.
4. Black shot
British Army Corporal Christopher Reynolds killed a Taliban commander nicknamed "Mula" with two shots at a distance of 1,853 meters. Reynolds had to wait for the target in ambush for three days. The corporal's first shot missed, but the range was such that the Taliban did not even immediately realize that they had come under fire. The sniper fired from an L115A3 rifle.
5. 25 football fields
The case of Craig Harrison is a prime example of how the media can ruin a person's life. While serving in Afghanistan, Craig saved fellow soldiers who were pinned down by machine-gun fire from Taliban militants. The incident occurred in Helmand province. The corporal fired six shots at a distance of 2,475 meters and was able to eliminate two machine gunners. Harrison's shot is notable because it was fired from an L115A3 rifle, and the distance to the machine gunners was almost twice the effective firing range of that weapon.
Unfortunately, Craig's name ended up in the media. Very soon, unknown persons began to threaten him and his family. The corporal himself began to suffer from a mental disorder (due to constant stress), and his family completely fell apart.
Do you want to learn even more interesting things? Then read about it, which everyone will appreciate.
A sniper's shot can not only hit the enemy, but also sow fear and panic in his ranks. Behind just one shot there can be years of preparation and weeks of waiting for the right moment. Often, spending a long time in the wild and waiting for a target, a sniper must have not only all the survival skills, but also the ability to not lose concentration at a critical moment. At such a moment, a lot depends on what kind of weapon he has in his hands. Modern sniper rifles are sometimes real miracles of engineering and are capable of hitting objects at a distance of more than two kilometers. We have selected for you the 10 most famous sniper rifles - from those that helped at Stalingrad to those used in modern special operations.
(Total 10 photos)
Post sponsor: Visas to England: The entire package of documents without leaving home!
Source: dnpmag.com
1. “Three-line” Mosin
In 1931, the Mosin rifle became the first Soviet sniper rifle, having received the “sighting tube” from the Podolsk Optical Plant. The design subsequently underwent certain changes. The “Three Line” performed well at short and medium distances during World War II. Thus, in the Battle of Stalingrad, 98 snipers of the 13th Guards Rifle Division killed 3,879 German soldiers and officers.
The ASVK, or large-caliber army sniper rifle, was developed in the USSR back in the late 1980s. This 12-kilogram rifle is capable of hitting lightly armored and unarmored military vehicles at a distance of up to a kilometer. You don’t even have to talk about defeating a person - a bullet fired from this weapon will fly one and a half kilometers at a speed of approximately 850 meters per second.
3. Vintorez
This silent sniper rifle was developed in the same 1980s as the ASVK. It was intended for special units. Later, after the collapse of the USSR, the screw cutter was actively used during the First and Second Chechen Wars, as well as during the Georgian-Ossetian conflict. The length of the rifle does not reach 90 centimeters, and its weight is less than three kilograms.
After domestic samples, it’s time to move to the USA, where in 1990 the Calico M951S rifle was developed, which perfectly hits targets at medium distances. Its features are a high rate of fire and an extremely capacious magazine that can hold up to 100 rounds. Which, however, is not surprising, since the model was created on the basis of the Calico M960 submachine gun.
5. Dragunov sniper rifle
The Dragunov self-loading rifle is the best example of the product of the Izhevsk Machine-Building Plant. This sniper gun was developed from 1958 to 1963 by a group of designers led by Evgeniy Dragunov. Over the years, the Dragunov has been modified several times and has aged a little. Currently, the SVD is considered as a high-quality, but standard rifle for a line fighter who is a sniper in the unit. Nevertheless, at a distance of up to 600 meters, it is still a formidable weapon for exterminating enemy personnel.
6. CheyTac m200 “Intervention”
CheyTac m200 “Intervention” - one of the components of the American sniper system CheyTac LRRS - has been produced in various modifications since 2001. This model is distinguished by its ability to hit targets at long distances (about 2 kilometers) with high accuracy. We can say that “Intervention” has become a real phenomenon in the world of computer shooters. So in the famous game “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2” it is present as one of the most powerful types of weapons.
7.AMP Technical Services DSR-1
The German DSR-1 rifle can be called the most accurate, however, only when shooting under ideal conditions - using specialized cartridges and the absence of wind. It belongs to the police or anti-terrorist weapons and is used by European formations such as GSG-9. Professional military personnel are not very fond of the DSR-1 - it is susceptible to dirt and sand, and in real combat operations, for example when there is an explosion nearby, it misfires.
8. Accuracy International AS50
AS50 was first demonstrated to the general public in January 2005 at the ShotShow 2005 exhibition in the USA. The 1369mm equipment weighs 14.1 kilograms without optics and ammunition and is intended primarily for special operations. A sniper can fold or unfold it with lightning speed and put it into combat readiness. High accuracy of shooting over long distances, a device for mounting various, including night, optics make the AS50 one of the best modern examples of sniper rifles.
This rifle has an interesting history of creation. The M82 was assembled by American Ronnie Barrett in his garage back in 1982. After the refusal of a number of leading arms companies, he decided to launch small-scale production for the domestic market. 7 years later, the Swedish Army buys 100 rifles from Barrett Firearms, and then the US Army pays attention to them during Operations Desert Storm and Desert Shield. Today the Barett M82 is in service with several dozen countries and can conduct targeted fire at a distance of almost 2 km. The rifle is present in a number of famous films and computer games up to GTA V, which once again confirms its authority.
10. Accuracy International Arctic Warfare
Another brainchild of the legendary English company Accuracy International Ltd., which has had no equal since 1980. The UK uses it for military purposes, and modified models are used by special forces and police. However, on the civilian weapons market this rifle is positioned as a “sports rifle” - for example, in Russia a few years ago it could be bought in a gun store for about 20 thousand dollars. The AWM fired the longest recorded combat sniper shot in history, with British soldier Craig Garrison firing at a distance of 2,475 metres. The “cultural footprint” of this weapon can also claim a record - the AWM is mentioned in a number of the most famous computer shooters, including Call of Duty, Battlefield and, of course, Counter-Strike.