John recently asked about stopping power in guns.

Well, John, here is the article I referenced, thanks to VMAX. Hopefully it will help you out.

As for me, I'll take a slow-moving .45 to a gun fight any day. I absolutely despise a 9mm for defensive situations (yes, they will eventually kill but often not quickly enough to prevent the BG from doing you in first)and a .380 as well. These are probably the two calibers I see most often on the autopsy table.

But then, I've seen most everything. I've seen a guy killed by a .416 Rigby, as well as a suicide to the head with a .44 Mag that didn't penetrate the skull on the other side.

The long and short of it is that you just don't know how ANY bullet will react to tissue and bone until you open them up and take a look. I've seen hardball fragment and hollowpoints act just like hardball. That said, shoot what you're comfortable with and place your shots well whatever caliber you use.

The .357 is gloriously effective. It's just that semi-autos are much more common than they used to be, so we see far more 9mm and .380 rounds on the autopsy table than we do the .38 and .357. Particularly among the gangbangers, the 9mm and .380 are the weapons of choice. The .357 is a wonderfully effective round for self-defense from what I've seen, but it's rare that we get them in anymore.

Again, this is from experience that I've made my calls on what works and what doesn't. I have no use for mouse guns like the .32, although it's a lot better to have a mouse gun than nothing at all. Personally, I'll never carry anything smaller than a .40 and prefer the .45. Day in and day out, results from the autopsy table show me that the .45 is the gun to have in a gun fight, provided you can shoot it well. If not, it's better to have something you can shoot well, even if it's a mouse gun, than something you can't.

Yeah, tell me about it, Smitty. I spent most of my life in Knoxville, TN and absolutely loved it. But then, my job is working in the Medical Examiner's Office, and, as you said, this is a target-rich environment. Having a job in an Atlanta morgue is job security at its best.

KRL, I'll take slow and heavy to light and fast any day. What I want is a round that plows through bone and tissue and expends ALL of its energy in the body. That said, the 125-grain .357 is marvelously effective.

Posted by: eddiebear at 09:50 AM | Comments (11) | Add Comment
Post contains 453 words, total size 3 kb.