New Year’s Eve may be the biggest night of celebration of the entire year. We celebrate with kisses, fireworks, a toast and…gunshots?
While some may find it hard to believe their neighbors may go outside at midnight and fire bullets up into the air to ring in the new year, it happens.
All over the country and right here in Florida.
In 2016, right after midnight, shots went off outside a church in Orlando where the New Year's Eve service was just wrapping up. A bullet grazed a 9-year-old girl.
On the same night, a bullet struck a 17-year-old in the leg while she was watching fireworks in Tampa.
And the Tampa Police Department makes it very clear, it's dangerous, unacceptable and against the law!
And here's the scientific reason why:
A standard .30 caliber bullet fired straight up into the air by a rifle can go more than a mile high in just 18 seconds. It then returns to Earth in about 31 seconds, and during the last few thousand feet, the bullet maintains a "nearly constant" lethal speed of more than 200 miles per hour.
The results: property damage, injury and sometimes death.
And this can happen anywhere up to a two-mile radius of the shot.
And, if you’re caught firing your weapon to celebrate, you’ll be arrested, on charges ranging from a first-degree misdemeanor to a third-degree felony.
So, just light a sparkler, kiss your sweetheart and have a great and safe 2020.
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