I was watching Mythbusters earlier today (rerun) where they were testing the myth about diving and swimming into the water in order to escape a barrage of bullets. The myth ended up being confirmed. There’s a great quote comparing a bullet from the M1 Garand (ooooh jealousy!) to a bullet from the .50 cal, “This kills you, this kills you and everyone else in the room.” A description that’s apparently quite accurate.

Have a look at the beast yourself. Observe the impressive water tower that occurs when the bullet hits:

Reading up on the M107 Long Range Sniper Rifle, I came across this … very fascinating bit of information:

Leaders and scouts viewed the effect of the 50 cal round as a combat multiplier due to the psychological impact on other combatants that viewed the destruction of the target.

“My spotter positively identified a target at 1400 meters carrying an RPG on a water tower. I engaged the target. The top half of the torso fell forward out of the tower and the lower portion remained in the tower.” 325th PIR Sniper

“There were other personal anecdotes of one round destroying two targets and another of the target “disintegrating.”

One shot. Trained sniper. .50 Cal. Ow.

Okay, this may be exceedingly morbid, but I wonder what varmint hunting would look like with one of these things bolted to the railing of your deck in the back yard. “Heeere little squirrelly …” My guess is you’d have nothing more than a small puff of fur fluttering through the air with no other visual evidence of it’s demise to speak of.