This is a long post because it addresses a number of things in the detail I believe is necessary for proper understanding.

Although we’re still learning details about the attempt on President Trump’s life on 13 July 2024, and will probably never know everything, the information that has come to light thus far has resulted in innumerable opinions and speculation. Because of my interest in precision rifle shooting in general and law enforcement sniping in particular, I have paid most attention to the claims regarding the shot by a US Secret Service sniper that killed the shooter in the midst of his indiscriminate murder spree.

In particular, at least one commentator reportedly characterized the sniper’s effort as a “one in a million” shot. The supposed rationale for the statement was that the killer’s head was visible to the USSS sniper only “from the eyes up.” And the most credible claim thus far I’ve seen about the distance from the sniper to the murderer is that it was about 190 yards.

Those two claims, the distance to the target (the killer’s head) and the size of the target (the head from the eyes up), prompted me to devise a simple test of the claim that there was a 0.0001% (1÷1000000) chance that the sniper could have achieved the results he did.

My targets for the test are life-size pictures of a man facing forward, and with only the upper part from the bottom of the eye irises up being visible. A shot that strikes the lower cover would be considered to be a miss.

This initial post in the thread will show the results of a shot I took today at the target from a measured 190 yards. But before getting to that, my rifle and its capabilities:

Tikka T3x TAC A1 chambered for the 6.5 Creedmoor cartridge. Suppressor Thunder Beast 30P-1. Scope 5-25×56mm, magnification set at 25× for the shot. Ammunition Hornady 140 grain ELD Match. Tripod Two Vets “Ruck” with Really Right Stuff “Anvil-30 ARC” ball head.

The tripod legs were extended far enough for me to use it for kneeling position support. No other support was used except for the Anvil-30 head clamped onto the Arca Swiss rail on the forend of the rifle. I have only recently started practicing shooting using a rifle clamped to the head of a tripod from standing or kneeling positions, and without any rear support from shooting sticks. The last method can be very steady for me; with just a tripod, though, not so much.

When I was aiming for the shot, my “wobble zone,” or the area within which the center of my crosshairs moved as I started pressing the trigger, was within the forehead area of the target, about 2.5 inches high and 4 inches wide. The last time I had fired this rifle was 12 days before, so this shot was totally cold from a cleaned bore.

The rifle:





The environmental conditions for the shot: overcast; temperature 62°; 49% relative humidity; 21.42 inches station pressure; light wind, 1:30 o’clock.

The impact:





Note that my hit was probably within an inch or so of where it’s believed the Secret Service sniper’s shot hit the attempted assassin. But more about that below.

I next shot a five-shot group from the prone using a bipod for front support at the same 190 yard distance. By that time the usual morning wind at my range had come up, and as usual it varied significantly from second to second. According to my Kestrel it varied from about 7 to 13+ mph, again from 1:30 o’clock. I believe the wind accounted for the group’s point of impact’s being left of the point of aim at the center of the diamond. The group center was a little high, but not enough to change my scope elevation setting.

The prone group shows what precision the rifle and ammunition are typically capable of—sort of. The prone position is very uncomfortable for me and I wasn’t as steady as I would have been a decade or so ago. But the group still measured 1.165 inch center to center, or ~0.59 minute of angle, and well within Tikka’s guarantee for a five-shot group with appropriate ammunition.





Now the comments and caveats in relation to the Secret Service snipers’ capabilities.

As I always try to mention in discussions like these, one shot samples don’t prove anything except that, as in this test, I was able to (mostly) replicate a shot that supposedly had a one in a million chance of success.

I nevertheless don’t believe that my shot was a fluke. Shooting from a similar support with the gun clamped to a tripod, I can reliably hit much smaller effective targets again and again.

But other factors.

My tripod. Although I have a heavier, more sturdy tripod like the ones shown in pictures of Secret Service snipers, I deliberately chose the Ruck model because it’s what I would rely on if I were still a law enforcement sniper—if not something even smaller and lighter. In my experience, larger, stiffer tripods are of most use if I try leaning into them for additional support.

Rifle. Although I don’t know what level of precision USSS sniper rifles are capable of, my Tikka’s is far more than adequate for the situation.

Scope. It’s reported that the USSS scopes are 7-35× models, so the sniper who stopped the assassin would have had more magnification than I do at a max of 25×. That doesn’t, however, mean he would have had a significant advantage over me in the situation described; I felt that 25× was plenty for the shot I took.

Snipers’ tripods. The snipers’ tripods are the heavier, more stable types I compare with mine. One in the picture I have has some sort of vise clamp of the “PIG” type and the other has the RRS Anvil-30 head. And to make clear, I am only assuming that the sniper fired using a tripod for support. It is perhaps more likely he fired from the prone position that would have been far more stable (at least in my experience).

Suppressor. My can is a direct thread mount so there’s no issues with unexpected complications as long as I don’t do something stupid. It doesn’t cause a POI shift with this rifle and ammunition, and has no adverse effect on precision.

Cartridge. The USSS reportedly uses rifles chambered for 300 Winchester Magnum. That’s significantly more powerful than the 6.5 Creedmoor I used, but under the circumstances the 6.5 would have been plenty enough to stop the attack.

Shooting conditions. This is the factor in which I enjoyed a major advantage over an LE sniper in an overwatch situation. I knew where the target was, its distance, what was expected of me, and of course I wasn’t shooting to save the life of a former president of the United States.

I nevertheless strongly suspect that because the sniper was able to deliver an accurate shot so quickly after the killer started shooting, he was already suspicious of and was watching him. It’s obvious (to some of us, anyway) that even if the sniper had been watching the murderer because of his location and actions, he would not have been justified in responding until the killer produced a visible weapon. And from showing a rifle to cranking off even eight shots could have literally been a matter of seconds. Keep in mind as well that watching someone through a high-powered telescope with limited field of view is not only tiring and requires breaks, but also ignores the sniper’s other responsibilities with regard to everything else in the overwatch area.

Shooter capabilities. This is another thing that no doubt differs greatly between someone like me and a Secret Service agent sniper. I shoot my precision rifles more than anyone else I know personally, but my training and trigger time are still much less than what we would expect someone like that to have. If nothing else, I would bet the rent that I’m at least twice as old as the USSS snipers we’ve seen pictures of. As I mentioned about the prone position, my age-related infirmities are things that I must often actively struggle to overcome.

Shot “placement.” Although my point of impact on the target was close to what we believe the POI on the killer was, and although my shot would have been instantly fatal, I believe the USSS sniper did a better job with his than I did. I of course have no way of knowing where he aimed his shot, but from where the exit wound appears to have been located, I believe the killer had turned his head slightly to the right (or that was the line of fire from the sniper) and the bullet probably went through the center of the head.

My shot being fired directly at the front of the face would have taken out the edge of the brain, but not gone through its middle. Because mine was an expanding bullet rather than what we believe was a nonexpanding open tip match bullet from the sniper’s rifle, mine might have caused more damage farther from the wound track, but certainly not enough to have made any practical difference to the outcome.

Plus, I actually doubt the claim that the USSS sniper would have had only the area of the killer’s head from the eyes up as a visible target. Unless it was the sniper himself who reported that fact, who would have known that? Plus if the killer was on the rifle in an active aiming position as pictured below, much more of his head would have been visible to the sniper. Maybe the murderer fired eight quick shots (within seconds) and then dropped his head down behind the peak of the roof to assess his results, so the “eyes and up” claim might be true, so that’s why I configured my target as I did.






Anyway, I doubt that my shot met any one in a million standard, but I hope to continue my test project by having other shooters do something similar. If that works out I’ll post the results here, so stay tuned if this sort of thing interests you (as it must if you’ve stuck out this post this far).

Added:
This is the best picture I’ve found of the killer on his rifle in a normal firing position showing that, yes indeed, it’s necessary to have most of one’s head and face exposed to counterfire when deliberately aiming. At this time we (I) still don’t know if he was in that position when the USSS sniper shot him, but I believe it’s more likely than that he was hunkered down and just peeking over the peak of the roof to see how he did with his shooting.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: sigfreund,

The FBI snipers occasionally shoot at the range I go to. Having witnessed their shooting, I could say that they would hit the snipers upper head as you detail it @ 99.XXX of the time. XXX being a fraction of a percent, it's possible they would miss once in a 1000. Not likely, but possible as a stationary target is easy to nail.

As reference, I qualified as "expert" in the military, and don't miss many shots as I still actively shoot. That said, I don't know what the SS snipers are doing for training or qualification, but I suspect it's comparable.

Now how to replicate a ,five by seven by five inch bobbing and weaving target.

How far away was the bad guy from the podium ?

Just not that difficult of a shot.

For people who don’t shoot, they think aLmOsT tWo FoOtBaLl FiElDs!

But there are thousands of people who will head to the woods in 3 months and make similar shots and hit somewhere within a 6” diameter of an animals vitals. And they’ll do it with cheap guns and cheap scopes that they haven’t shot since last year.

quote:

Originally posted by bendable:
How far away was the bad guy from the podium ?

It has been discussed in many Internet videos and forums and the earliest apparent guesses were that it was about 130 yards. My own measurement using Google Earth was about 160 yards. More recently I saw an estimate that included the 190 yard range from the sniper to the killer, and it mentioned 153 yards. The last is close enough to my estimate (and I didn’t have an exact podium location to use) that I believe it’s probably correct.

As for a moving target, I sometimes hang soda cans from strings that allow them to move in the wind. The last time I put one at 200 yards and engaged it from the prone, this was the result. I hit the can three times with my three shots, but all were right at the top above the contents so the bullets didn’t do anything other than punch holes in the aluminum.





One other thing about the would-be assassin is that shooting from the prone as he did would have pretty well fixed his head in one position.

To wrap up this not-too-serious project, yesterday and today I had three other shooters try to replicate the “one in a million” shot of hitting the forehead of the face target from a distance of 190 yards using the rifle and ammunition described above.

One shooter was an experienced precision rifle shooting competitor, one was a former LE SWAT member who had no prior experience with precision rifle shooting, and the last was an individual who was a good shot with patrol-type rifles, but had no experience with precision rifles.

The first two shooters shot from the prone position, and the last man shot standing while using for support only a large, sturdy tripod like the ones the Secret Service snipers were shown with. All three shooters scored three hits in the forehead area of their targets with the three shots each fired.

The sample sizes involved in all this were still very small, but should have been enough to demonstrate that although the USSS sniper’s shot was remarkable, especially under the real world circumstances he was faced with and were much more difficult than what I and my shooters had to deal with, it was hardly “one in a million.” If it had been, I calculated that the probability of three shooters achieving three hits with three shots each would have been one chance in a number far larger than the total number of stars in the entire universe.

And the point of all this? Just a reminder that sometimes even experts will say things that just aren’t true, and whose falsity can often be easily demonstrated with a little thought and effort.

Thanks for the attention and comments.

Why would this shot be falsely labeled as a one in a million shot? What is gained by this characterization?

quote:

Originally posted by pbslinger:
What is gained by this characterization?

I have no way of knowing for certain what the person who made the characterization thought could be gained, but one probable reason was to deflect some of the criticism being directed at the Secret Service for other reasons. Or maybe it was just someone’s way of expressing admiration for a difficult task well executed—as it was. If it were taken only as enthusiastic hyperbole, that would be fine, but it shouldn’t be understood as having real world relevance.

Because the sniper located the killer and fired so quickly after the killer started shooting, I strongly suspect that the sniper’s attention had been directed to the killer well before it was confirmed he was a deadly threat that justified being neutralized. It’s quite possible, likely even, that the killer was identified as a possible threat by his actions and location by direct observation and/or reports from officers who had seen him before but without a visible weapon. Prior to a weapon’s being visible to the USSS sniper(s), however, they would have had no legal or moral justification to shoot him. Low-crawling onto a roof within line of sight of the principal is highly suspicious, but not by itself justification to use deadly force.

If my speculation is accurate, a sniper would probably have been watching the man with high-powered scope or binoculars, but that’s all that would have been justified. Only after a weapon was produced and/or firing started could the sniper have been able to return fire. And no matter how prepared the sniper had been to do that, it would have still taken some finite amount of time for him to engage, and was probably easily enough time for someone to get off eight (or many more) shots in the interim.
It could have easily gone from, “What is that guy doing?” to, “Oh, shit! He’s shooting!” in an instant.

And to stress, this little experiment by me and a few other shooters only addressed the issue of marksmanship, none of the other factors that would have affected the sniper’s ability to deliver an effective shot to neutralize the threat. This thread should not be understood as being any more than that.

I suspect that the sniper had a view of more than just the would-be assassins head from the eyes up.

My reasoning comes from experience shooting on rooftop type props at matches, even the relatively flat roof that the assassin was on, and of the handful of photographs out of the attempted assassin's rifle.

He was using a 30 round magazine, which would have force him to get higher than he would have ideally liked to, in order to get his muzzle to clear the peak of the roof.

Typical height over bore for an optic on an AR-15 is 2.5 inches. Add in the standoff distance between the bottom of a 30 round magazine from within 2 feet of the peak of a roof.

My wild ass guesstimation is that the countersniper had a view of most of the attempted assassins head.

Whenever I shoot from a rooftop prop, I always make it a point to have a 20 round magazine somewhere on me belt to allow me to get low enough to utilize the peak of the roof as a rest, without the length of a 30 round mag preventing me from being able to get a more solid position.

We are all lucky that the would-be assassin wasn't more accomplished, even though he was still mere millimeters from a brain shot with poorly thought out/very average equipment.


ETA: I didn't initially catch your supposition that perhaps when he was shot, that he was hunkering down and surveying the damage just peaking over the edge. Definitely possible. Although with a 300 win mag, even if the shot from the SS hit an inch or two low, the scumbag would have still been DRT.

Commentators suggesting that it was a particularly difficult shot for the countersniper, are just revealing how ignorant they are.

It was, in the realm of precision shooting, especially among someone well trained enough to be a secret service countersniper, essentially a chip shot.

quote:

Originally posted by IndianaBoy:
Although with a 300 win mag, even if the shot from the SS hit an inch or two low, the scumbag would have still been DRT.

Indeed. I haven’t gotten into that in my marksmanship tests, but although I don’t know for certain what the peak of the metal roof was made of, it couldn’t have been anything to seriously interfere with a 300 Win mag bullet—or with almost any other centerfire rifle bullet for that matter.

quote:

Originally posted by sigfreund:

quote:

Originally posted by IndianaBoy:
Although with a 300 win mag, even if the shot from the SS hit an inch or two low, the scumbag would have still been DRT.

Indeed. I haven’t gotten into that in my marksmanship tests, but although I don’t know for certain what the peak of the metal roof was made of, it couldn’t have been anything to seriously interfere with a 300 Win mag bullet—or with almost any other centerfire rifle bullet for that matter.

It looked like a metal roof. The peak of those is usually a strip of flimsy aluminum.

I watched a video from the bodycam of one of the SWAT officers on the roof after the shooting. It had the 4-5 inch spaced corrugated ribs characteristic of a sheet metal roof.

quote:

Added:
This is the best picture I’ve found of the killer on his rifle in a normal firing position showing that, yes indeed, it’s necessary to have most of one’s head and face exposed to counterfire when deliberately aiming. At this time we (I) still don’t know if he was in that position when the USSS sniper shot him, but I believe it’s more likely than that he was hunkered down and just peeking over the peak of the roof to see how he did with his shooting.

I think I’ve found the answer to this question:

“Less than a second after the last of those eight shots, a ninth gunshot is heard. Then comes the 10-second pause.

The local law enforcement official close to the investigation did not know whether the local officer’s shot hit Crooks. But shortly after that shot, Crooks altered his positioning, the official said. Crooks stopped shooting at the rally site and slumped down behind the crest of the sloped roof where he was perched, the official said."

And:

“The official confirmed there were a total of 10 shots: eight by Crooks, one by the Butler County officer and the last by the Secret Service.“

Link

The crux of the article is the ninth shot was a Butler officer firing from 110 yards away after which the shooter repositioned such that all the SS counter-sniper could see was the shooter’s eyes and forehead peaking over the ridge vent for the tenth shot and final shot. There’s a lot more in the article about multiple spectator videos and witnesses verifying that’s what happened.

Thank you for posting your test. I’m wondering if the one in a million comment was based on a misconception that the north SS counter-sniper team took the shot through the foliage of the tree that blocked their view of the shooter. Maybe a retest with foliage is in order?

quote:

Originally posted by trapper189:
I think I’ve found the answer to this question:

Thanks very much for that.

I didn’t sign up for the Washington Post article, but I found something similar, I believe, on Police 1.

I agree that you’re right that the killer probably dropped down behind the peak of the roof after the Butler County SWAT officer fired at him. That would then make sense of the claim that the Secret Service sniper had only his upper head visible for his shot. As pointed out, a 300 Win Mag bullet or most other centerfire projectiles would have had no trouble punching through the roofing material, but a good shot is a good shot.

What I was particularly interested about from the article was the reported timeline of 16 seconds from the murderer’s first shot to the USSS’s neutralization of the threat. From the first I heard of the incident I strongly suspected that very little time elapsed from first to last shot. Although I will still withhold final conclusion, that report is exactly what I expected. And a few seconds here or there won’t change my admiration and thanks to the LEOs who ended the incident so quickly. This was the first I’d learned of the Butler County officer’s action and we can only wonder how many lives his fast action saved.

That timing also indicated to me that far from the killer’s not being seen and/or ignored by law enforcement, including the Secret Service sniper, they were no doubt watching him on the roof, but contrary to what many Internet commandos evidently believe, LEOs aren’t justified in shooting someone just because he looks suspicious and is walking around in an unexpected location.

But I also found this statement from the article significant.

“Local police were looking for him when he started shooting from the rooftop.”
There are many details still to be learned about how law enforcement reacted to the reports of a suspicious person, but that statement sums up what I also strongly suspect to be true. There can be no doubt that mistakes and poor practices helped make the murderer’s actions possible, but although that’s obvious, I believe some of the hate fest frenzy will die when the full and accurate account is told.

Amazing what a little accurate information can do to a narrative.

Thanks again.

Oh, yeah: I was annoyed that the Police 1 article repeated the early FBI statement that DJT was “grazed by a bullet fragment.” Even the FBI has admitted that he was hit by a bullet (duh!), and the writer of this article should have known that by now. But as the saying goes, hope for careful journalistic reporting in one hand, and ….

The reports I have heard were saying around 130 yards, but either way not too difficult of a shot. I do not understand why they are saying that only the top of the head was in view? He was standing at a podium and he is a tall guy. What was obscuring the lower portion of the head. I would say it could be a much more difficult shot if you were trying to punch a hole in the top of the ear. This kid was not a good shot, thankfully. But he should never have gotten the chance to do what he did in the first place.

quote:

Originally posted by vjb.knife1:
I do not understand why they are saying that only the top of the head was in view?

As discussed at length here, the “only visible from the eyes up” refers to the killer who shot at DJT and into the crowd. It does not refer to President Trump. As trapper189 explained, it’s possible that when the killer stopped shooting because the local SWAT member fired at him, he dropped down off the rifle and only the top of his head was visible to the Secret Service sniper who shot and killed him.

I absolutely would not have conducted an experiment and started a thread to show how President Trump could have been successfully shot. There are people who would do such a thing, but I am not one of them.

Although the 130 yards figure for the shot from the killer to DJT was widely reported immediately after the incident, it’s also been discussed here that it was more likely about 150 to 160 yards. A skilled shooter could still have easily achieved a hit on a man-sized target at such distances, but as usual a lot of discussion and reporting does not make much effort to determine precise details.

Bringing this back up for some additional discussion based on more recent information.

I am interested in President Trump, especially his safety; long range precision shooting; and the capabilities of law enforcement snipers. I therefore have continuing interest in this question which is how difficult was the Secret Service sniper’s shot to end the threat posed by the killer at the Trump rally on 13 July 2024?

One new thing is that based on what I consider the best currently available information, most of the murderer’s entire head was probably visible to the USSS sniper, and not just from the eyes up. The most compelling reason (for me) why that’s true is the report that the sniper’s shot hit the killer just to the left of his mouth, and no indication that the bullet passed through any intermediate materials on the roof. I was always puzzled by the belief based on a closeup photo of the killer’s head that the point of impact was above his left eye, and that was because there wasn’t any apparent blood drainage from that spot. There is, however, apparent drainage that supports the later point of impact report.

The fact that most of the murderer’s face would have been visible doesn’t of course change the fact that the sniper’s shot was exactly what was needed under the circumstances.

The other thing that I learned today was a statement in The Wall Street Journal that when the USSS snipers saw local police officers moving to an area with guns in hand, and “The frantic scene prompted snipers to place their rifles in tripods and start searching through their scopes.” I actually believe that just like at least one sniper whose picture we have seen countless times, it would have made more sense for at least one rifle to have already been on a tripod. In any event, even though the article didn’t say so, I strongly suspect that the killer-neutralizing shot was fired using a tripod for support.

So, after all that, what’s the point of this post? I have recently been trying to improve my marksmanship when shooting with one elevated support, i.e., using a single tripod which is how I believe the Secret Service snipers operated.

With that goal in mind I have been shooting a number of drills that I’ve discussed in other threads, but today I fired a series with a Tikka T3 Tactical model chambered for 223 Remington. Based on the results I can say that using that rifle made it significantly easier to achieve good results than using my Ruger 77/22 and 22 Long Rifle ammunition. One of the benefits of the Tikka in its MDT chassis is that it’s much heavier. Another, I believe, is that the much higher velocity of the 223 bullets that also reduced the effects of any shooter errors. And third, I believe that the rifle and the ammunition I used, IMI 77 grain OTM LR Mod 1, is simply a much more consistently precise combination. This is one of today’s targets:





For convenience today the targets were a reduced size version of a target originally developed for a law enforcement sniper qualification course. The full size dimensions of the outer rectangle are 6×10 inches, and the full size oval measures 3×5.5 inches. The two zone sizes and shapes were chosen to simulate restricted zones for effective torso and head shots. The reduced targets were 1/4th the size of the originals and my shooting from 50 yards today was equivalent engaging the full targets at 200 yards. I shot standing using a large tripod with Arca head to support the rifle. One of the USSS snipers pictured in reports of the incident was similarly equipped. To add a little stress to the drill, I timed the shots starting with a loaded magazine in the rifle, bolt open and back, and I was completely off the scope. All of my first shots were fired in under 10 seconds, and most in six to eight seconds.

Although the Secret Service snipers would have had other significant obstacles and challenges to deal with during the attempted assassination incident that I didn’t have, from purely a marksmanship standpoint I believe that my results once again demonstrate that getting a head shot hit from an estimated distance of 190 yards would not have been anything remarkable for trained professionals.