Tuesday, January 16, 2018

British Gun Turn-In: Heavy on Air Guns, Low on Ammunition

Some nice antiques on the table


Image from bristolpost.co.uk
 England promoted a national firearms amnesty/turn-in during 2017. In Bristol, 313 "guns" were turned in, along with a whopping 120 rounds of ammunition!

That is one round of ammo for every 2.6 "guns". I put "guns" in quotes, because only 186 of the 313 items were actual firearms. Most of those had no ammunition for them.  Here is the breakdown. From bristolpost.co.uk:

A breakdown of the guns handed in...

  • Flare 3
  • Shotgun 80
  • Rifle 25
  • Air weapon 96
  • BB gun 14
  • Pistol/Revolver 81
  • Starter pistol 11
  • Slaughtering gun 2
  • Stun gun 1
More than 35% of the guns (110) are air-guns (BB guns are air-guns).  That is a higher percentage than what I observed in Australia during the 2017 gun amnesty., in that country. The number of air-guns I saw during the Australia amenesty amounted to a bit more than 25%.

The ammunition turn-in at Bristol was underwhelming. I wonder how many actual firearms turned in might have been kept if the owners had ammunition for them.

The article shows how significant the lack of ammunition is. To create a scary hypothetical, the author has to dig deep.

A .38 revolver was turned in.

Separately, a bag of .38 ammunition was turned in:
“For example, a .38 revolver was surrendered and, separately, a bag of live .38 bullets. The two combined would have been a lethal weapon that could have fallen into the hands of criminals and caused significant harm or death.
The implication is that almost none of the guns turned in had ammunition turned in with them. That fits the given numbers.

The U.S. has over 400 million guns. No one keeps track, but during the four years of the .22 ammunition bubble, approximately 20 billion rounds of .22 ammunition was sold in the United States.  Most was stored, not shot. I do not have an estimate for centerfire ammunition, but it would be in the multiple billions of rounds.

It is not unusual for a single firearm aficionado to have 50,000 rounds of ammunition.  Private gun owners in the United States could easily possess a 100 billion rounds of ammunition or more.

The United States will not be following Australia or England anytime soon.

©2017 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice and link are included.

Gun Watch

3 comments:

ExpatNJ said...

Dean wrote:
"USA will not be following Australia or England anytime soon."

I immediately - and without hesitation, reservation, or hyperbole - agree with and endorse that sentiment.

Dean also wrote:
"During 4yrs of .22 ammo bubble, ~20B rounds of .22 ammo was sold in USA."

At full and equal dilution, that statistic would mean that an average of 60 or more rounds of .22 is now in the hands of every man, woman and child in America! And, the 'lowly' .22 is a highly-versatile caliber, capable of being used for everything from varmint eradication, to hunting, to personal/home defense, etc.

Americans have been and continue to buy - and no doubt cache - anything that shoots. Their reasons vary. But, Americans' underlying thoughts, beliefs, and fears, can all be distilled into 1 idea: Americans intend to remain free, NO MATTER WHAT.

The Right to Keep and Bear Arms is NOT about 'duck hunting. It is about keeping The King (and criminals) out of your face, just like during the US Revolutionary War. Statists, power-hungry politicians, and all enemies foreign and domestic, wishing for (or trying to incite) Civil War II in the USA, would do well to remember that.

Unknown said...

And England has turned into one of those "Shithole" countries! Between their Gestapo Thought Police and a government that welcomes Islamic Terrorist...I don't see it getting better anytime soon!

Anonymous said...

why do you keep "trotting out" that bogus 300-400 mlln figure for private gun owner-ship in the US ?
common sense should tell any-one that it is many times greater than that..

consider:
US ppltn... approx. 350mlln;
US adult ppltn: approx. 250mlln;
est. adult gun-owners: (min.) 150mlln;
av. gun owner-ship: (min.) 6 ;
total: 900mlln;

and... even that would be conservative...
the actual n°s could be well in excess of ONE BILLION...maybe as high as 1½ BILLION;

the 300-400mlln figure is a canard 'trotted out' by the gun-grabbers who vainly attempt to minimise gun-owner-ship in the hope of 'marginalising' gun owners as part of a 'minority'...