Another mass shooting - largest in a good while, by a few victims

[skepticalbip]

If he had stolen a large truck and drove through the fence at 50mph, he could have probably killed four or five hundred of them and wounded many more.

Nope. Think about it. Those people were not packed like sardines. If you've ever been to an open air concert you should know better than to spout that BS.

If you look at videos of this particular concert, you will see that there were fences on both sides of the audience confining them into a specific area. Other videos taken during the concert shows them standing shoulder to shoulder for it looks like sixty to seventy yards back from the stage before they started thinning out.

If the audience had been as scattered as they are in a typical open air concert in a park then the shooter would not have been able to hit so many people. Them being so packed in is why he just had to point toward the mob rather than having to take aim at individuals.

 

[untermensche]

It is distraction and handwaving to say what happened could have happened differently.

All we can do is try to make what happened less likely.

We cannot make the world perfectly safe.

 

[skepticalbip]

The M16 is a military (not civilian) rifle. All M16s already have a full automatic capability. It is just a matter of moving the selector switch between safe, semi, and full auto. positions

The civilian version, the AR15, does not have a full automatic capability. The selector switch only has safe and semi options.

Yes the AR15 can easily be converted to full automatic.

It's nothing more than changing out a few parts.

It is more than changing parts unless you mean changing to a M16. To convert the AR15, there is illegal parts and millwork required. You can't just covertly buy the parts and stick them in because they will not fit.

 

[untermensche]

Yes the AR15 can easily be converted to full automatic.

It's nothing more than changing out a few parts.

It is more than changing parts unless you mean changing to a M16. To convert the AR15, there is illegal parts and millwork required. You can't just covertly buy the parts and stick them in because they will not fit.

Nothing you're describing is difficult to a person with even basic skills.

People don't do it only because it is illegal.

Again, Bottom Line: The more semi-automatics = the more automatics.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

What is going on is that many of us understand the defensive benefit of guns outweighs the mass shootings. Most other gun uses are by criminals and gun control laws won't stop them.

You believe a fallacy

Try counting.

The self defense cases are at most local news so you'll have to look for some overall data on them. It's several hundred per year killed in self defense, wounded is something like 10x this number. That's several thousand cases a year where the threat was serious enough to pull the trigger--and most of those translate into a serious crime derailed.

That's well in excess of the deaths from 50 years of mass shootings.

 

[untermensche]

You believe a fallacy

Try counting.

The self defense cases are at most local news so you'll have to look for some overall data on them. It's several hundred per year killed in self defense, wounded is something like 10x this number. That's several thousand cases a year where the threat was serious enough to pull the trigger--and most of those translate into a serious crime derailed.

That's well in excess of the deaths from 50 years of mass shootings.

The problem with guns is not confined to mass shootings.

Once again I see you have pulled your figures from one of your orifices.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Silencers are about protecting one's hearing, not about hiding where a shot came from. "Silencing" a rifle isn't going to much to hide it.

We know that's the NRA's bullshit claim.

The fact remains that a silencer in this situation would have allowed this murderer to kill a lot more people before police located him.

And I suppose 2 + 2 = 3 is also a fact?

Reality:

1) The range was long and he was firing into a very noisy environment. The shots weren't identified at first anyway--suppressing a noise that isn't heard anyway means nothing.

2) At the range he was shooting a subsonic round isn't going to do much and a suppressor does nothing about the CRACK! of the supersonic flight of the bullet. People in the hotel would hear him no matter what.

3) Once the fact that there was a shooter was known it would be much easier to locate him by the muzzle flash and by the broken window than to locate him by sound.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Back in the day when I was in the Marine Corps I knew exactly how to convert a semi-automatic M16 to full automatic.
.

The M16 is a military (not civilian) rifle. All M16s already have a full automatic capability. It is just a matter of moving the selector switch between safe, semi, and full auto. positions

The civilian version, the AR15, does not have a full automatic capability. The selector switch only has safe and semi options.

Swap out a part on that AR-15 and you have a full-auto weapon.

- - - Updated - - -

The M16 is a military (not civilian) rifle. All M16s already have a full automatic capability. It is just a matter of moving the selector switch between safe, semi, and full auto. positions

The civilian version, the AR15, does not have a full automatic capability. The selector switch only has safe and semi options.

Yes the AR15 can easily be converted to full automatic.

It's nothing more than changing out a few parts.

Selector switches can easily be changed.

Have you ever seen what a gunsmith can do?

They can create parts whole. Modify anything.

Bottom line: The more semi-automatics in society the more automatics.

This guy had guns, he had money. He obviously didn't care about the law. Yet he didn't have full auto--the threat isn't that big.

 

[untermensche]

This guy had guns, he had money. He obviously didn't care about the law. Yet he didn't have full auto--the threat isn't that big.

If the law was he could not own a semi-automatic would he have had one?

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Try counting.

The self defense cases are at most local news so you'll have to look for some overall data on them. It's several hundred per year killed in self defense, wounded is something like 10x this number. That's several thousand cases a year where the threat was serious enough to pull the trigger--and most of those translate into a serious crime derailed.

That's well in excess of the deaths from 50 years of mass shootings.

The problem with guns is not confined to mass shootings.

Once again I see you have pulled your figures from one of your orifices.

Making guns illegal won't disarm the criminals. Thus I would not expect to see much change there. Making guns illegal does keep the crazies from engaging in mass shootings but that's about it. Just look at Australia--graph the murder rate before and after, you can't see the point where they did their big gun ban.

The thing is you are focusing on guns. I don't care, I'm looking at dead innocents regardless of method. You may feel better by saving that shooting victim but if it comes at the cost of a couple of people stabbed to death it's not worth it.

 

[untermensche]

The problem with guns is not confined to mass shootings.

Once again I see you have pulled your figures from one of your orifices.

Making guns illegal won't disarm the criminals. Thus I would not expect to see much change there. Making guns illegal does keep the crazies from engaging in mass shootings but that's about it. Just look at Australia--graph the murder rate before and after, you can't see the point where they did their big gun ban.

The thing is you are focusing on guns. I don't care, I'm looking at dead innocents regardless of method. You may feel better by saving that shooting victim but if it comes at the cost of a couple of people stabbed to death it's not worth it.

Making guns illegal will make less guns available for criminals and make illegal guns more expensive.

It will not make the world perfectly safe.

Only safer.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

The problem with guns is not confined to mass shootings.

Once again I see you have pulled your figures from one of your orifices.

Making guns illegal won't disarm the criminals. Thus I would not expect to see much change there. Making guns illegal does keep the crazies from engaging in mass shootings but that's about it.

Umm... isn't that like.... umm... what we are going for?

Just look at Australia--graph the murder rate before and after, you can't see the point where they did their big gun ban.

The thing is you are focusing on guns. I don't care, I'm looking at dead innocents regardless of method.

Well that seems really fucking stupid. Wait... make that extraordinarily fucking stupid. Method doesn't matter? I don't believe in seat belt laws. How a person dies is irrelevant.

You may feel better by saving that shooting victim but if it comes at the cost of a couple of people stabbed to death it's not worth it.

It'd been harder to kill and harm those people throwing a box of knives out the window at that hotel. I mean yeah, people would have been hurt, but... probably not quite as bad.

 

[RavenSky]

We know that's the NRA's bullshit claim.

The fact remains that a silencer in this situation would have allowed this murderer to kill a lot more people before police located him.

And I suppose 2 + 2 = 3 is also a fact?

Reality:

1) The range was long and he was firing into a very noisy environment. The shots weren't identified at first anyway--suppressing a noise that isn't heard anyway means nothing.

2) At the range he was shooting a subsonic round isn't going to do much and a suppressor does nothing about the CRACK! of the supersonic flight of the bullet. People in the hotel would hear him no matter what.

3) Once the fact that there was a shooter was known it would be much easier to locate him by the muzzle flash and by the broken window than to locate him by sound.

"Reality" is not the same thing as whatever opinion you pulled from your ass. In EVERY video from the scene, the sounds of the gunshots are very audible - so much so that even you - Mr. Self-Appointed Expert of Everything - claimed he couldn't possibly have had a fully-automatic gun because the spacing between shots wasn't perfectly even.

It may have taken people a few seconds to realize the sounds they heard were gunshots and not fireworks, but the fact they could hear the sounds allowed them to react quicker than if people simply started dropping and bleeding with no discernable reason.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

2) At the range he was shooting a subsonic round isn't going to do much and a suppressor does nothing about the CRACK! of the supersonic flight of the bullet. People in the hotel would hear him no matter what.

Yes, I think there is someone firing an automatic weapon in a room near me and it is really dampening the mood in the room.... Yeah, he might be using a noise suppressor. Uh huh, but I can still hear a "cracking" sound.... Look, these hookers aren't doing anything until the sound is lowered... and I'm on the clock.

3) Once the fact that there was a shooter was known it would be much easier to locate him by the muzzle flash and by the broken window than to locate him by sound.

While sound can bounce and stuff... it certainly can HELP locate a person. Even with the sound, it took them a bit to find him. Let's not make things harder than they need to.

 

[Horatio Parker]

Yes, I think there is someone firing an automatic weapon in a room near me and it is really dampening the mood in the room.... Yeah, he might be using a noise suppressor. Uh huh, but I can still hear a "cracking" sound.... Look, these hookers aren't doing anything until the sound is lowered... and I'm on the clock.

3) Once the fact that there was a shooter was known it would be much easier to locate him by the muzzle flash and by the broken window than to locate him by sound.

While sound can bounce and stuff... it certainly can HELP locate a person. Even with the sound, it took them a bit to find him. Let's not make things harder than they need to.

I read today that it was 72 minutes from the first 911 call to the cops entering the room.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Yes, I think there is someone firing an automatic weapon in a room near me and it is really dampening the mood in the room.... Yeah, he might be using a noise suppressor. Uh huh, but I can still hear a "cracking" sound.... Look, these hookers aren't doing anything until the sound is lowered... and I'm on the clock.

While sound can bounce and stuff... it certainly can HELP locate a person. Even with the sound, it took them a bit to find him. Let's not make things harder than they need to.

I read today that it was 72 minutes from the first 911 call to the cops entering the room.

I think he was located at 20 minutes. Then they called SWAT. A very big question is going to be, were the Police holding their lives over the public's well being.

72 minutes, I presume you can only maintain a psychotic high for so long.

 

[coloradoatheist]

I read today that it was 72 minutes from the first 911 call to the cops entering the room.

I think he was located at 20 minutes. Then they called SWAT. A very big question is going to be, were the Police holding their lives over the public's well being.

72 minutes, I presume you can only maintain a psychotic high for so long.

Did they know what room he was in at 20 minutes or just that he was shooting from somewhere in Mandalay Bay?

 

[ZiprHead]

https://www.google.com/search?q=ar+15+full+auto+kit+for+sale&rlz=1C1NDCM_enUS719US721&oq=ar15+auto+kit&aqs=chrome.4.69i57j0l5.20433j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

 

[Horatio Parker]

I think he was located at 20 minutes. Then they called SWAT. A very big question is going to be, were the Police holding their lives over the public's well being.

72 minutes, I presume you can only maintain a psychotic high for so long.

Did they know what room he was in at 20 minutes or just that he was shooting from somewhere in Mandalay Bay?

Dunno. Apparently hotel security found him first, and a security guard was shot in the ankle through the door.

I also saw an item that said he fired for nine minutes. That would suggest he was located within nine minutes, but it took another hour to organize entry.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Nine minutes. Geesh, you call that a catastrophe?! Take 9/11, now that was a complete disaster, believe me!