It was a pretty nice day and the waterfront was packed with families at the Family Camp. I was sitting with several other people on the grassy rise outside the fence, overlooking the swimming area. I was pretty much the farthest person from the water, along with some other people, and so the closest to what happened. Suddenly there was a burst of gunfire from the woods across the ball field to my back. Not full auto, but it was someone with a semi-auto pulling the trigger fast. And it was loud, really loud. And big. It was no .22 rabbit sprayer.
But we are in Alaska, no big deal yet. Guns are part of Alaska's awesomeness, right? Another round went off and I heard what sounded like someone crashing through the bushes. In the space of no time at all my mind made this progression. At first I thought some idiot was running through the woods hunting something spray'n pray style. Then I thought a bear was coming and someone had been shooting at it. Then what was really going on dawned on me and I realized what the buzzing noise was that I heard but not really registered in my mind.
Someone said that they were bullets and people started looking around dumbly. They were probably feeling the same as me, and that was that it couldn't really be bullets, though I new it was. I've heard the sound in movies before, and to hear it in real life seemed like a paradox. Guns sound very different when you are in front of them instead of behind.
Another spurt went and the bullets buzzed and whizzed through the trees, breaking branches cracking through the foliage. The whine of the bullets was the most disturbing because we couldn't see them. As humans we rely on sight as our chief sense, and when the source of danger defied that sense it gave me a strange helpless feeling.
Some people began to move and get down. The slope of the hill down to the water made the waterfront the safest place, and the bullets were going parallel the the shoreline anyway, so there wasn't really anything to do.
This took a long time to describe, in reality it took about ten seconds. Two of the guys in charge went running into the woods yelling to stop shooting. I couldn't sit still so I went to where I knew I could see where I suspected the people shooting were, without getting into the line of fire. There is a lake off of camp property that nestles right up against the obstacle course and I could see, on the other side of the lake, some people shooting in the direction of camp. I don't know the circumstances, and I don't know the people. But my entirely uninformed guess is that they were shooting at the water or something on the water, not thinking about the bullets skipping. One more round of shots went off and I could see them pointing the gun in my general direction. I felt like a dork but I laid down. I decided something right there, I don't think I would do well in a real war situation. Think about it, there was one gun, they weren't aiming at us, and likelihood of anything bad happening was pretty small. And yet I was still freaked out. Those bullets were within 100 yards of me and that was way too close. War does not appeal to me personally. I get nervous in paintball.
As I said, I don't know the circumstances so I won't condemn anyone (mainly because I'm afraid they might read this and beat me up, or shoot at me again). But please don't shoot without a backstop in a populated area.
2 comments:
You were right to lay down, we are so far from much real danger that we all looked around dumbly, some of standing up to see what was going on when what we really should have been doing was grabbing our kids and getting down. It was a pretty good wake up call for me, not to take for granted that we are always safe.
Farrah
Ya that was pretty scary. Of course I was curious to know what it was. Alaska has had another adventure.
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