An Army sniper has set a new record for the longest confrimed kill in Iraq at over three-quarters of a mile.
RAMADI, Iraq -- Gazing through the telescopic sight of his M-24 rifle, Army Staff Sgt. Jim Gilliland, leader of Shadow sniper team, fixed his eye on the Iraqi insurgent who had just killed an American soldier.His quarry stood nonchalantly in the fourth-floor bay window of a hospital in battle-torn Ramadi, still clasping a long-barreled Kalashnikov. Instinctively allowing for wind speed and bullet drop, Shadow's commander aimed 12 feet high.
A single shot hit the Iraqi in the chest and killed him instantly. It had been fired from a range of more than three-quarters of a mile, well beyond the capacity of the powerful Leupold sight, accurate to 3,300 feet.
"I believe it is the longest confirmed kill in Iraq with a 7.62mm rifle," said Sgt. Gilliland, 28, who hunted squirrels in Double Springs, Ala., from the age of 5 before progressing to deer -- and then to insurgents and terrorists.
"He was visible only from the waist up. It was a one-in-a-million shot. I could probably shoot a whole box of ammunition and never hit him again."
(HT: RCaston.)
The American miltary can indeed boast some of the greatest marksmen in the world. However, I wanted to point out that the world record for the longest confirmed sniper kill is held by a Canadian. A small, elite group of Canadian soldiers were supporting American soldiers in combat in Afghanistan. Cpl. Rob Furlong made a confirmed kill of an al-Qaeda combatant from 2.4 kilometers away:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rob_Furlong
The world record was broken a few days earlier by another member of the squad, but Furlong beat it by 120 m.
Just trying to set the record straight...
Thomas