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There are no boring stories—only boring writers. But if a writer’s bored with a story, then both the story and the writer are boring. To wit: TTAG’s recent Top Shot coverage, or lack thereof. It’s the same non-deal with the big bore exploits of FPSRussia. We’ve given the faux Russkie Irresponsible Gun Owner of the Day (IGOTD) gongs for not wearing hearing protection, not wearing eye protection, shooting too close to his target (ricochet rabbit), skimming rounds off water and not looking downrange while firing. At least. And that would have been that. Only it wasn’t . . .
As everydaynodaysoff.com pointed out, Kyle lasers the entire production team with his rifle as he’s airlifted away in his recent episode. Members of TTAG’s Armed Intelligentsia may wish to pass judgement on the dangers of FPS’ positioning on the chopper and his shooting technique, but I couldn’t possibly comment.
Anyway, FPS further consolidates his hold as TTAG’s Top Not So Top Shot. I’m sure he’s laughing all the way to the bank—right until he doesn’t.
Just envy of the top 1% of gun owners.
I particularly like how he points the muzzle directly at the rotor blades on his reload.
I’m guessing he could empty an entire mag through the rotor without hitting a blade. I’m also guessing that even if every round hit the blade, it wouldn’t hurt the chopper much. Ricochet might be a problem, though.
In a situation like that, there really are no safe directions to point the gun, unless you have a good unobstructed view of the ground.
Actually, helicopter blades are extremely fragile, and expensive. One of the pilots I contract with to do deer surveys had a guy throw an empty plastic water bottle up into the main rotor when the helo was idling, totaled a $40,000 set of blades. When we use an AR-15 to shot hogs we have to use a shell catcher, again to avoid hitting the blades.
It’s just generally a good idea to aim at your lifeline. A round into the transmission, hub, or rotors could ruin that spiffy Russian accent.
when I saw tim treadwell on the oprah show talking about living with bears, I told my wife it was only a matter of time before they killed him. couple of years later it happened. this guy is on borrowed time. I am amazed he could find a chopper pilot who would fly him to do that. they are responsable for their passengers.
He found two chopper pilots. The one who gave him the ride and the one carrying the camera man. And who probably also came close to getting shot God-knows-how-many times.
Stupidity isn’t limited to one profession or trade. I wonder how much this guy spends on pretending to be Russian.
this kid is SO rich its disgusting. There is no way he pays for stuff like this off of you you tube channel alone.
Rich parents. I think he comes from a wealthy family if I remember correctly
Houston Armory paid for the production of this video, either in part or whole. Good bunch of guys.
I especially enjoyed hearing the rotors stutter when the explosion sucked all the air pressure from under the foils.
Every time you link to his videos, and we look at them, we’re just adding to his hit rate, which ends up encouraging him – correct?
Encourages his add sponsors.
If that were MY aircraft, and this idiot pointed his muzzle at MY rotor disc, my crew chief would have provided him with a rapid change in status to pedestrian. Probably without landing the ship first.
I’ve done quite a lot of camera rigging on Bell 206s (the helo used here), Hughes 500s, etc.
– He’s strapped in (note climbing harness) to the helo, isn’t going anywhere.
– The rotor blades on most all twin blade turbine helicopters are quite strong. Strong enough to saw through the tail boom and drive shaft while maintaining integrity (more or less), trees, you name it. A stray shell isn’t going to cause them to fail, nor any other small chunk of FOD. Were they that fragile, they’d blow apart before the thing ever left the ground, much less maneuvered. The UH-1 blades, of which the 206s are largely the same, got shot to absolute crap in the Nam era, and the birds still flew. Yes, if you hit something critical and non-redundant like a gearbox or fuel/oil line, you’re going to have an eventual loss of power/control and will require an autorotation. A single small arms round through rotors at flight speed (or even several dozen) is not going to bring a helicopter down 99.99% of the time. That’s no excuse to point a weapon through the rotor disk while not being shot at by bad guys, but exaggerating the danger is silly.
– There is no rotor “stutter” on the film helo when the pyro goes off– what you’re hearing is a mic distorting due to amateur sound recording.
– He does laser the camera crew during the final “dope on a rope” sequence, but do we know that weapon is live to begin with? It’s careless, yes, but significantly less so if the weapon is safe.
– He actually goes out of his way not to laser the camera with the SAW, which clearly is live, on several occasions.
Silly, yes. Careless, sure. But very unlikely to cause anything other than some pants-crapping hysteria among the safety police crowd*.
(Unless, of course, the weapon during the rope-a-dope sequence was actually live.)
Although a single round or even a couple of round aren’t likely to destroy a rotor or even the transmission, it’s just generally good practice to not tempt fate. Whatever. It’s not my helicopter or my life on the line.
Minus the helicopter faux pas, Kyle seems to be making better gun safety decisions in his latest videos. That’s something I can at least applaud him on.
Why is it that I have such a hard time summoning my indignation over these FPS Russia videos? It is, however, pretty amusing watching the armed intelligentsia piss their pants every time he posts one of these.
I imagine it’s because most reasonable people don’t have any cause to be upset. I honestly think these FPS Russia posts are, at best, 10% safety concerns and 90% priggishness.
1.) FPSRussia’s videos are entertainment, or at least, infotainment when he talks about the weapons. If you’re watching them as instructional videos and then go kill yourself, you probably would’ve already done so from watching a Michael Bay flick.
2.) Nobody cares if he’s not really Russian or that his name is Kyle. Harping on this point is pure jackassery: It’s like complaining about the gunplay in a Rambo movie, and then constantly referring to Rambo as “The [i]faux[/i] warrior” and reminding everyone that his real name is Stallone. No frickin’ duh, guy.
3.) Wealth envy. The ones saying he’s “so rich it’s disgusting,” etc., should just pick up a sign and sit with their local Occupy movement already.
The pants-pissers aren’t concerned for his safety. They want something to go wrong, preferably in spectacular fashion, so they can cluck and say “I told you so!”
Haters gonna hate. And whore for hits.
The helicopter and the range they were shooting looked alot like one I saw a story on. They are actually set up to train people to shoot from helicopters since shooting from a moving platform is so different. Yes, he did cover his crew momentarily during the dope on a rope part but seemed to be paying some attention because he lifted the muzzle away from them. I don’t see this one as nearly as bad as some of his other videos.
Yet as “irresponsible” as he is he has killed less people than the entertainment industry. Why don’t you whiny girls grow a set!