This quotation combines two of my pet peeves:
The power of the media has taken center stage in the hunt for the shooter -- or shooters -- who has used a high-velocity rifle to slam a single bullet into 10 victims since Oct. 2....
(Full story here). Apparently the editors at Reuters don't work on weekends, because there are three things wrong with this sentence.
1. What's a "high-velocity rifle"? That means a rifle that travels fast, right? Just like at the beginning of the old "Superman" TV show, "Faster than a speeding rifle...More powerful than a locomotive...."
2. The JFK assasination conspiracy nuts love to talk about the "magic bullet" that tumbled through President Kennedy and Governor Connolly, and how one bullet couldn't have gone through both. Well, they can be quiet now, because now that "shooter" has "slam[med] a single bullet into 10 victims." One bullet...10 victims...some of them 50 miles away from each other. This sniper is a much better shot than people are giving him credit for.
3. It ain't the velocity that gets ya, it's what it does when it's inside. Imagine if there were a gun that fired a projectile one atom wide at nearly the speed of light, and someone shot you with it. Maybe it would do a little damage as it passed through, but it wouldn't kill you. A typical .223 bullet (which might not be what the shooter is using) is designed to tumble once it hits a target, which can cause massive internal injuries. Likewise, a low-velocity weapon can be just as deadly, if not more -- the reason most Civil War soldiers had their limbs amputated after being shot wasn't because of the primitive medicine of that era, but because the slow, heavy rounds would shatter bones when they hit.
Bonus pet peeve: twice I've seen references to "police wearing flak jackets" and "gas station attendants donning flak jackets." There are some new military flak jackets that can stop pistol rounds, but in general, flak jackets are used to stop battlefield shrapnel, and are useless against bullets. What the reporters mean is "body armor" or "bulletproof vests," unless the policemen and gas guys think the sniper is going to start using mortars or artillery pieces to attack.
