How can a bullet so narrow knock out such a large piece of bone?

[Ramon F. Herrera]

On one hand, we have a 6.5 mm projectile which left an entry hole of say, 7 mm. Or, 10 mm, tops.

The hole left by the missing bone in the back of the head can be determined by the eye witnesses:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DX58vrL5ZiA

FF to minute 5.

We have read or heard before: "baseball size", "grapefruit size" and "fist size", "egg size". This is the first time that I read the description used by Dr. Pepper Jenkins.

To be sure: the question is not about the bullet's exit diameter (in the middle of the bone): let's accept that it was roughly the same as the entrance's diameter. I am not asking about the perforated hole (10 mm), but about the knocked out, or pushed hole.

IOW:

Perforated: Converted in dust, lost. Imagine a Craftman drill.

Knocked Out: Picked by Harper.

Well, the extremely precise answer is right here. State of the art technology allows us to reach an accuracy that was unfathomable in a good portion of the previous 50 years:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6iuVr9V6os

[FF to second 10, "Pressure Field"]

That pressure, indicated by the beautiful color red/yellow is exactly the same size as Dr. Jenkins' palm.

-Ramon

Edited October 6, 2015 by Ramon F. Herrera

[Pat Speer]

The temporary cavity surrounding a bullet reflects the width of the disruption in gelatin, a soft tissue simulant. Although the two are related, there is no exact correlation between this and the size of the exit defect on the skull. A shotgun blast, for example, will leave a huge hole, due to their being so many little paths and little holes beside each other. The same can be true for a high-velocity bullet that breaks up on impact with the skull, or even within the skull while tumbling. But a high-velocity bullet that remains intact will not necessarily create a huge hole upon exit.

P.S. The flight of the Harper fragment at frame 313 can not be explained by its exploding upwards in response to the temporary cavity of the bullet. I discuss all this stuff in detail in chapters 16--16c of patspeer.com.

Edited September 26, 2015 by Pat Speer

[Ramon F. Herrera]

The temporary cavity surrounding a bullet reflects the width of the disruption in gelatin, a soft tissue simulant. Although the two are related, there is no exact correlation between this and the size of the exit defect on the skull. A shotgun blast, for example, will leave a huge hole, due to their being so many little paths and little holes beside each other. The same can be true for a high-velocity bullet that breaks up on impact with the skull, or even within the skull while tumbling. But a high-velocity bullet that remains intact will not necessarily create a huge hole upon exit.

P.S. The flight of the Harper fragment at frame 313 can not be explained by its exploding upwards in response to the temporary cavity of the bullet. I discuss all this stuff in detail in chapters 16--16c of patspeer.com.

Hi Pat: My goal is to perform a simulation, and since the computations are so complex, I am starting with a minimalist scenario. I am defining the bone to be a perfect circular disk, of the exact same size as the maximum pressure leading edge of the incoming wave. The complexity of future simulations will increase. See my posts here:

http://forum.assassinationofjfk.net/index.php/topic/1725-looking-for-douglas-horne-and-david-mantik/

http://scicomp.stackexchange.com/questions/20831/need-to-perform-a-computational-fluid-dynamic-simulation-analysis-of-a-human-bra

In fact, my first CFD simulation will be 2-dimensional, not to mention the fact that the bone (brittle matter) simulation will add another layer of complexity.

This is Step 1:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulSv3M7dHO8&feature=youtu.be

[spoil Alert!]

The fascinating part will be that as more details are added, and the simulations approach reality, the movement of the subject will exactly match that seen in the Zapruder film.

That feat will be mathematically impossible for the Warren side to achieve.

-Ramon

Edited September 26, 2015 by Ramon F. Herrera