Gunfire and flashes in the night

H

HighValleyRanch

New member
Last night at midnight, my wife and I woke to the sound of gunfire up the hill from us. We live in a rural area, so even gunfire in the middle of the night is not uncommon.
Must've woken after several rounds, so went to the living room window to look up the hill where the sound was coming from.

In the darkness of the night, I could see brilliant white flashes coming with each shot fired. There were more than six shots fired consecutively, so I figured that it must've been a semi auto. The shots were too close together to be a bolt action, and the sounds were closer to a higher pitch handgun.

Each flash lit up the hillside for an area of about 30 feet to a brilliant white.
The distance from our house to that point up the road is about 3/4 mile.

Having not shot too much in the dark with any of my semi-auto's, would the muzzle flash be that bright out of a handgun?

Maybe 7 more rounds fired by the time I got to the window and then it entirely stopped. No use calling the sheriff's department, because it is legal to shoot on rural property, and the response time is so long that it all would have been over by the time that they arrived.


Just curious about the brilliant white flashes.
 
Muzzle flash vary between handguns (and rifles too) depending on loading, barrel length etc.

Some can be controlled. Example is a M14/M1A using standard M118 7.62 ammo. With the flash suppressor of that rifle, you don't see the muzzle flash.

M16s you do. M60s look like a trip flair (which is why in combat you don't fire one at night unless its really necessary).

Pistols/Revolvers are the same, you get fast powder in a long barrel you're going to have less flash then slow powder in short barrel. Revolvers have the added problem of the flashed caused by gas escaping from the cylinder gap.

I play a lot at night or low light. One thing I like about the laser sight, is even temporally blinded by the flash you can still see that red dot on a target. Something a flash light wont fix. The flash will blind you a tad making it hard to see the sights, but the red dot still shows up.
 
In a rural at area night I'd think about anything shot would light up the night. That may be what they were doing just seeing how light it would get. Most poachers wouldn't be firing that many rounds. They could have been more courteous time wise, but when you're out running around drinking beer you lose track of time.
 
Well, I know that my ruger alaskan would light up the night!:eek:

But judging from the sound, it was more a medium caliber semi, so unless it was a short barrel, I would be curious about the amount of muzzle flash one would get from a .40 caliber or .45.

But again, in the pitch dark, from a distance, it might light up more than I expected. Never have been in a position far away from the shots to see how much the light carries.

Not poacher, but someone letting off steam or having fun more likely.
 
Wow, that is quite a fire ball, but.....

It ends up that one of my neighbors was setting off some type of small explosives or fireworks and those were lighting up the night.
 
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