I was curious to see which was the longest recorded sniper kill and stumbled upon Craig Harrison. He was serving in Afghanistan and killed a Taliban machine gun team from 2,475 meters, or 1.5 miles away. According to a post, it took around 6 seconds to hit his targets. However, the [weapon](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accuracy_International_AWM) he was using (L115A3) has a muzzle velocity of 936 meters per second. Using simple math, shouldn’t it have taken only 2.6 seconds to reach his target? Harrison himself claims that he had the perfect conditions with clear weather and no wind. Given all this information, what took so long for the bullet to hit? Was it because of elevation or some does my ape brain not comprehend this question?
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The very sneaky mistake you made is that you assumed muzzle velocity was a static measure of the speed of the bullet. In reality, air resistances is perpetually draining velocity from the listed muzzle velocity the instant it is fired. It was 936 m/s at the muzzle, and when it hit him it was going MUCH slower.
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