Decoding Ballistics: In the firearms section of the Bexar County Crime Lab, scientists study how guns and bullets work. This is a crucial part of finding out what happened.
Every year, experts like Holli Worden and her team look carefully at the lab’s thousands of guns and boxes of bullets. Most of their attention is on guns, ammunition, and shells found at crime scenes or taken by police.
Holli Worden, a forensics expert, describes the careful process: “Every gun makes its own pattern of tool marks, and these patterns are different at the microscopic level. We can see the empty shell and the ball moving through the tube. Each barrel has a different set of tool marks.
Like a fingerprint, each gun and bullet is different. Scientists need to figure out what happened and how the aliens might have been involved in a murder.
They have a big tank of water that they use to shoot and catch shots. In a different room, the lab keeps an extensive collection of guns and ammo that can be used as a massive library of comparisons.
Worden says, “Everything we get is to figure out if that gun was used in that crime.” I test-fire a gun to see if the bullets fit the ammo cases if I find it at a crime scene, on a suspect, or even on a police officer.
Worden was working on a case involving more than 120 bullets from four killings when we went to the lab. Her job was to carefully compare the size and shape of each shot. This showed that 12 or 13 different guns were used over two days.
This past year, the three forensic scientists who work in the firearms area were very busy reviewing close to 2,500 different pieces of evidence. This means that every month, each writer must look at more than 100 pieces of proof.
Worden said it best: “There aren’t many jobs where people can say they get to shoot guns as part of their job, so it’s interesting.”
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Our Reader’s Queries
How do you understand bullet trajectory?
Understanding bullet trajectories relies on several crucial elements: air resistance, angle, air pressure, temperature, muzzle velocity, bullet shape, and drag coefficient. Each of these components plays a role in ensuring that a bullet reaches its intended target with accuracy.
What is FPS in ammunition?
Kinetic Energy (KE) is determined using the equation: KE = W(V)2 / (450,435) ft/lb, where V is the velocity in feet per second (fps) and M is the mass in pounds, calculated from the weight of the bullet in grains divided by 7000 grains per pound times the acceleration of gravity (32 ft/sec).
What is meant by terminal ballistics?
The study of terminal ballistic involves analyzing how missiles penetrate various targets, including solids and liquids. It also examines the ability of bullets to wound animal tissues and investigates materials that can resist bullets, such as jackets and vests.
What is the physics of ballistics?
Ballistics involves the mechanics of how projectiles are launched, how they fly, and the impact they make. This field specifically focuses on ranged weapons like bullets, bombs, and rockets. It’s the science of designing and accelerating projectiles to achieve a specific result.