Police Shoot Escaping Buffalo

B

Benonymous

New member
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. -- Police Monday shot and killed five buffaloes that escaped from a meatpacking plant.

Instead of fleeing, the buffalo began grazing in a yard and police fired at the buffalo with semiautomatic rifles as each charged officers one-by-one.

"If five of them would have charged at once, I'm not sure we would have had enough manpower to kill all of them," Colorado Springs police Lt. Larry Laxson said.

The buffalo managed to get out when a truck driver didn't properly park his truck in the delivery chute at the G & C Meatpacking Plant, said plant owner Frank Grindinger.

Two homes were evacuated and police cordoned off several blocks.

By the time all five animals were shot, at least 120 rounds had been fired, a few that hit empty houses and a nearby car, Laxson said. The first buffalo took several shots in the head and "didn't even flinch."

"It was not a good ending. We did whatever we could to try to capture the animals without killing them," Laxson said.

Nearby resident Martha Muehl said she felt bad for the animals, but added people are the main concern.

"It's horrible, but it would have been even more sad if they had killed a person," Muehl said.

Grindinger, the plant owner, said six buffalo escaped in December 2003. Three were also shot by police.

FIVE shots in the HEAD!!!! I guess the cops in this precinct should be issued some .338's or something!
 
By the time all five animals were shot, at least 120 rounds had been fired, a few that hit empty houses and a nearby car, Laxson said.
Click to expand...

I thought buffalo were large animals. So large in fact, that to miss one and hit houses or a "nearby" car would indicate a poor shot. Oh well, I guess you had to be there. :rolleyes:
 
See! See!, we all need .375's (or just name whatever you want) just in case the buffalo ever get out again, at least that is what I told my wife. She was not ammused...so I am getting one anyway. Won't your 30-06 work? Oh no, I said, "much too small...heck even those cops had a hard time with their rifles!!!" :D
 
If they were using poodle-guns to shoot bison this shouldn't surprize anyone. But in the interests of safety, both of the officers concerned and anyone else in the area, you would have thought that someone could have come up with something more appropriate for the job.

Had "the highly trained" and "responsible" not been so fortunate, it could easily have turned very ugly and deadly in a few seconds.
 
Get 'em inside the plant quick enough, and you can still pack them and send them buffalo burgers to market. :) Wonder what caliber they were using...223? Yahoos can't hit a buffalo - lucky no innocent was hurt.
 
They could convert their AR-15 types to the .458socom then they would have something appropriate !!!
 
I can just imagine some leather shop, somewhere, getting a buffalo skin with all these little .22 caliber holes in it.

No doubt it would've been amusing for some civilian to show up with his Sharps 45-70 and drop the buffs with one shot each. (Then demand reimbursement for his "special" Buffalo loads!)
 
There is video footage of it on http://www.kktv.com/ down on the bottom righthand column in the video footage section.

I couldn't tell what they were shooting at the first two with, possibly multiple .223s but the final one shown in that footage was hit at least 3 times with a 12 guage which appeared to be firing buckshot the second shot one can see the hair 'lift' in a broad impact range. These weren't even *big* buffalo, they appeared to be only in the 900-1000 lb range.

Still the one thing that the footage seemed to illustrate to me was that none of the members firing was a hunter. That impact I mentioned above was well high, hitting in the 'hump' on the shoulders, and the first shot taken that starts the charge appears to have hit it rather far back on the rump. Very poor shooting. Given the apparent lack of any real aggression on the part of the buffalo prior to shooting, and their reaction even after the shooting I fail to see why it wouldn't have been possible to 'herd' them back into a position that they could have been reloaded onto a trailer.

Then again, I grew up on a farm and worked for several years in a feedlot. What may have been apparent to me may not have been apparent to a lot of city folk.
 
Pretty abrupt charges there. It's impressive how a couple of 'em keep going after being hit again and again.

A: They were using inadequate rifles.
B: It's not easy to practice for that kind of thing.
 
Let's see - -

It was about 16 years ago a friend asked mne to go out with him to sight in his "buffalo guns." Sure, happy to.

He had a Model 70 in .30-06 and a custom Remington Rolling Block .45-70 with a long and super heavy octogon barrel and full length brass scope. Weighed a ton.

Turned out he had been invited to go on a herd thinning trip. A careful planner, my pal did a lot of research on American bison anatomy and practiced planning shots from different angles. He took two animals, a BIG bull and a medium cow. One 180 gr from the '06 at a little over 100 yards, and one 500 gr lead bullet from the .45-70 from a little under 100. He donated the meat and had the HUGE bull's head mounted and a robe from the cow.

Decent rifles, good planning, careful shooting. Piece of cake. :cool:

Best,
Johnny
 
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