Do Bullets Fired Upwards Pose a Risk When They Return to Earth?

[latentcorpse]

Apologies if this is the wrong forum but it's certainly a physics question I've been wondering about:

I've been watching all this Libya stuff unravel on the news and can't help but notice all these guys firing their AK47s vertically upwards. Surely that bullet should then return to Earth at the same speed as it left the gun at (minus air resistance effects obviously)? Obviously it owuld be difficult to fire it exactly 90 degrees to the surface of the Earth so that it came back down and hit you on the head but surely it must be possible that it could go up and come back down and land relatively close by?

So my question is, why does this not happen? Why do people not die from these returning bullets? Do they break up in the atmosphere or something?

Thanks.

 

[tiny-tim]

Hi latentcorpse!

They do injure. They do kill.

In Jordan alone …

Over the past four years, officials recorded 106 festive firing-related incidents, which resulted in the accidental death of five people and 57 injuries.​

… see http://al-shorfa.com/cocoon/meii/xhtml/en_GB/features/meii/features/main/2010/09/09/feature-02") for more details.

 

[latentcorpse]

Hi latentcorpse!

They do injure. They do kill.

In Jordan alone …

Over the past four years, officials recorded 106 festive firing-related incidents, which resulted in the accidental death of five people and 57 injuries.​

… see http://al-shorfa.com/cocoon/meii/xhtml/en_GB/features/meii/features/main/2010/09/09/feature-02") for more details.

Thanks! Wow, that's pretty frightening!

 

[LaissezDairy]

They'd be going at terminal velocity before they hit someone - of course, bullets are specifically designed to have low air resistance and so would have a very high terminal velocity.

 

[vela]

Wikipedia has an entry on everything!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celebratory_gunfire