Interesting video. Thanks for posting. A few comments:
1. the shot through the branches is well done. If there was any doubt before, this makes it clear that tree branches do not cause jacketed bullets to deflect or even deform, let alone lose their jacket. Someone should show this to Gerald Posner who not only thinks that the oak tree deflected it over to the curb near Tague and also deformed it, causing it to lose its jacket.
Gerald Posner?s theory of a tree deflected bullet has not been a popular theory among LNers for many years. I don?t know if half the LNers ever supported it.
Of course, Gerald Posner was not a ballistic expert and did not perform any scientific experiments like Luke and Michael Haag have done.
2. The asphalt test shows a noticeable plume of debris in an area where there quite a few people. It is difficult to imagine no one around noticing it and even more difficult to imagine that no one ever found the divot.
Even with almost all eyes on the President and Jackie? Even so, I recall there were a few witnesses who reported dust being kicked up off the street.
3. I would be surprised if the bullet jacket completely disintegrated. The jacket has a much higher melting point (1085 Celsius as opposed to 327C for lead). The bullet compression results in molten lead that explodes into a spray of tiny droplets in all directions that essentially disappear. But there should be large jacket pieces around. I would like to see the slow motion version of the film.
I don?t think the bullet melts. It is just torn apart into small pieces. The lead and the copper jacket both. I never read anything in Larry Sturdivan?s book that describes bullets fragmenting due to partial or total melting.
The Haags searched for the bullet and/or large fragments, and found none.
Is there anything in the literature by a ballistic expert about bullets melting, partially or fully, as a result of striking rock or asphalt? Or any target?