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Hearing gunshots.........

2K views 17 replies 14 participants last post by  purple88yj 
#1 · (Edited)
[Mods please move if this fits into a different section better]

Ok so I wake up yesterday, and do the standard routine to get ready for work. ABout 8:30 am. Our neighborhood is generally really quiet about this time.

I literally step out of the shower, and hear "BANG" followed by a scream. :gah: The wife had just gotten back in bed from dropping our daughter off at school, and she said what was that? I said sounded like a gunshot. She said someone screamed. She was now WIDE awake.

Then "BANG" followed by another scream. :gah: So, wrapped in a towel, noticing no other sounds, like glass breaking, ricochets, or cars fleeing, I grab for the cell phone and look out the window down the street. Adrenaline was full rush by now! Then I run to the livingroom and look out the front, we live on a corner, so I can see down both streets from the house. Nothing moving, then "BANG" :gah: followed by yet another scream, so I start dialing 911. This all happened in about 1-2 minutes total. Really quick.

I call in "sounds like 3 gunshots" and give the necessary info. I hang up and get dressed quickly and head to the front door. My neighbor directly across the street is a Sheriff's Deputy, and his neighbor beside him is a City Investigator. I look outside to see 1 unit turn down the street, and open the door. Then I see the Investigator, who had JUST left to go to the PD come down, followed by a 3rd unit.

I know the 3rd guy, so I step out to the car and give the details, and he takes off. My neighbor and the Inv. wife come down the street and ask if I heard it. I said "hell yea".

The Sheriff Dept said he thinks it came from the northeast side of the neighborhood, I say the southeast, which is to the right of my bedroom. The Investigator's wife says the same as me. Then we laugh about having different stories. So the 3rd guy comes back up the street, and says they think it was a truck backfiring, and the Investigator is going to check along w/ the 1st unit.

The Investigator comes down to the corner where we are standing, along with the Major form the PD now and here is what we were told. 3 houses down on my right, where I said the noises came from, there was a tree company removing trees, and they had started up the truck and it was backfiring. :hand5: I asked who was screaming, and the Investigator said it was the driver. Everytime it would backfire, it would scare him. I have to believe it, as it was as loud as me shooting my XD45 with no hearing protection, from where I was at.

We stood and talked for a bit, as other neighbors made their way around to see what the ruckus was about. The Investigator told them we were having a block party and this is how we were going to get everyone's attention. :rofl: Then it was back to normal life.

All of this happened in about a 13-15 minute time frame. I still made it to work on time and it's a 10 minute drive.

Lesson from this for me........ adrenaline is a tough thing to overcome in such a situation. I consciously felt myself going up on high and thought myself back down enough to think clearly and atleast call it in. I didn't grab my firearm first, not knowing what was going on and who was involved.
 
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#2 ·
I asked who was screaming, and the Investigator said it was the driver. Everytime it would backfire, it would scare him.
:haha: that's freakin' funny. Was it a girly scream or what? :rofl:

At least your neighbors have common sense. Last year, while working, some turds were driving around, rolls down the window and shot four or five times. I don't know if they saw me, but as soon as the gun came out of the window I hit the ground and hid behind a van. The car raced off, and I waited for the car to leave (I could hear it head out of the only enterance/exit on the property).

I called 911, reported everything and told dispatch where I'd meet up with the responding officers. While I was waiting for the officers I was walking around trying to find out where exactly they were shooting (whether it be cars, a building, fence, or what) I found all of the shells and one of the bullets. (Yeah, the PD was taking their time to get there...) Only two people came out of their residence and asked me if that was fireworks or a gun. Everybody else never even heard the shots (it was a 9mm that was shot).

The next day the office got all sorts of complaints of hearing fireworks the night before --- most had no idea what happened. :sheep:
 
#3 ·
Tros-
well, I mean, "it can't happend here, right? If it sounds like a gun, it must really be a truck/fireworks/balloon, etc."
I have noticed some people seem so oblivious it is amazing, and these are basically intelligent people. Very strange, and I guess the result of some subtle, lifelong psychological conditioning.
God Bless and be careful.
 
#8 ·
I'm only 21 but I know the 'it cant happen here, right?' thing is a bunch of BS. I live on a private lake 20 miles out of my normal stomping ground of jackson(aka little detroit). When I was younger, the michigan militia tried to blow up the owner of a mechanics shop not 50 yards from my front door. My neighbors truck was stolen a few years ago, he found it two weeks later out on the ice of the lake! Then there was the couple tons of stuff(think it turned out to be a farms fertilizer shed or something) went kaboom about 5 miles from my house, big enough explosion where I heard and felt it like a cannon going off next to me.

There is no such thing as "it cant happen here". It can, and likely will sometime.
 
#4 ·
Tros......... yea it sounded like a girl screaming. You know that high pitch fear scream??? The one that makes you HAVE to turn to find type scream.

These were WAY too loud to be fireworks. And I'd say the tree company needs to do some SERIOUS work on that truck.
 
#5 ·
Two extremes - the average sheep will explain a gunshot as a backfire or firework.

We OTOH will tend to hear a backfire or firework and think gunshot:wink:
 
#6 ·
IN today's world of fuel injection, you shouldn't ever hear a backfire anymore.

These trucks were like Ford F700 or something maybe an LN series, so they may still be carb'd. Either way I'd rather make a guess in the worse case direction.
 
#10 ·
Gun shots, fireworks, backfiring vehicles, transformers fuses blowing are common here. All have a slightly different frequency, if your ears are still good, you can tell the difference.
Most gun shots at night here are poachers using rifles or shotguns.
 
#11 ·
Gunshots in my neighborhood just means my neighbor is home doing some target practice. You should be lucky you have such quick response time for the PD. Around my parts even the deputies tell you don't count on us! Real comforting but true!!
Glad it turned out to be what it was.
 
#12 ·
many mango seasons ago i lived in miami. the gun fire went on each and every night. we would set by the pool at night and some nights it sound like a small war going on. on some nights you could hear full auto fire coming from richmond hights area. on new years, christmas, and the 4th of july you felt as if you was back again in a fire fight. don't need fireworks in miami, just shoot your gun in the air when your at a party. everybody does it. the day time gun fire was mostly from the "bg" doing their trade.
 
#13 ·
Your neighborhood sounds a lot different than mine. Gunshots are the norm. On new years eve, I sit and listen to all the different pops, bangs and booms and try to figure our what everyone is shooting. I'll say that was a 9mm, or oh that guy has a .45! I doubt the cops would even show up if anyone called. I definitely stay inside at night. Though it's still pretty funny when a guest is over and they freak out - were those gunshots?!?
 
#14 ·
Speaking of hearing gunshots... I heard a lot of gunfire last night for New Year's Eve. Went out this morning and found where a bullet fired into the air had hit my parent's car. There are some stupid people in this world. And yes before you ask, I am looking for a safer place to live.
 
#17 ·
I live in the country,so we hear shots all the time...but one night about 10pm we hear a load shot coming form our neighbor(a judge).I 'm thinking disgrunteled ex con or something..so I call his house to make sure everyting's ok....he says it was HIM trying out a new gun!Turns out he's got a range in his yard w/ flood lights.He was glad I called to check tough.I told him I'd be his back-up if he needed it.Since then he's been shooting almost every day.He's invited me to shoot,but we have different scheduals.He's retired now,and apparently spends all his pension on ammo!
 
#18 ·
I do go into the defensive mode until I have distinguished the source.

If it sounds a long way off, I am less likely to grab my gun, but there have been a few occassions where I have snatched my gun in one hand, my sweatpants in the other and litterally jumped into them as I headed out the door. I met my neighbor in the front yard one evening when the ground transformer gave us quite a start. I with my handgun, he with his shotgun.
 
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