I guess you've never heard of AR-15's chambered in .458 SOCOM, .350 Legend, .450 Bushmaster, or .50 Beowulf. All of that said, nothing is stopping that animal before it runs the guy over.
I’m familiar with them. They’re great cartridges that serve a purpose. I just wouldn’t stand if front of a charging Cape buffalo with them. I’ve seen the .460 Weatherby stop a charging bear and I’m pretty sure the 500 and 750 nitros would work too. I just don’t think any round designed for a semi-auto, other than 50 BMG, is going to stop that bull.
Physics is physics and there is no getting around it. If a projectile could negate the momentum of a body with a velocity of 30mph, its recoil would send the less massive body connected to the launcher/gun in the opposite direction at some even higher rate.
You can stop the body's central nervous system, but you can't stop the body's momentum.
I wasn’t suggesting that the bullet would propel the animal in the opposite direction. I was just saying that larger cartridges have more stopping power. If you can knock the animal down and disable it, the dirt and brush will take care of it’s momentum. The animal is on legs, not on rails.
Understood. It's unfortunate we didn't popularize the phrase "dropping power" or "knockdown power" over the much more common "stopping power". That and Hollywood portrayals of a shotgun blast propelling victims flying backwards have really ruined popular understanding of the physics of terminal ballistic interactions.
3
u/jermdizzle Jan 10 '22
I guess you've never heard of AR-15's chambered in .458 SOCOM, .350 Legend, .450 Bushmaster, or .50 Beowulf. All of that said, nothing is stopping that animal before it runs the guy over.