Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Handguns Permanent Wound Channel with handgun

Just read an article that says that the permanent wound channel between 9mm, 40SW, and 45ACP is indistinguishable to surgeons or medical examiners. In addition the article states that 6 out of 7 handgun shootings are not lethal. I am inclined to believe if 12-13 inches of penetration from a HP is made regardless of caliber that the permanent wound cavities are going to be about the same. With the hit ratio for the police shootings being only 20% of fired bullets one would think that a more controllable pistol with more ammunition would be favored over a larger bore, higher recoiling, holding less ammunition pistol.

Yes. Evidence shows number of handgun hits on target trump bullet size.

I'm only a doctor of bullshlt, but have to believe the 'cutting' you get, as well as drilling a hole from a Barnes solid copper HP would be a hell of a lot harder for the Sawbones' to contend with, I shot two deer and a small pig with my 45 ACP carry load using the Barnes 185's at 1125 fps, did a little looking around at dressing, they were all chewed up pretty bad with exits, the big 9pt buck I hit at 41 yards in the liver at and out offside frontal ribcage with a 10mm and 200gr XTP had much smoother looking wound cavity damage, if that makes any sense.

Animals, and not people yes, but, our standard everyday crackhead would not survive either through the vitals, too damn deep with too much damage.

Yes, it is difficult to distinguish wound channels among the various calibers, so here's a handy guide:

If the guy on the ME's table has one hole, it's from a .357 Mag, 10mm, or .45
If the guy on the ME's table has two holes, it's a .40.
If the guy on the ME's table has three holes or more, they're from a 9mm.

I chuckle everytime I read that a small caliber pistol has the same size wound Channel as a larger caliber.

That only happens if the larger caliber is slow and the smaller caliber is much faster. When a 45 ACP is in the 1100 FPS range their is no way on earth that the wound Channel isn't larger than a 9.
I've shot too many game animals to believe the BS that they are all equal.
Bullet choice also plays a role such as a quality jhp in 9mm is going to trump a 45 ACP at 850 FPS with FM round nose bullets

The 9mmin +P is certainly adequate and has definate advantage of holding more rounds.

This is my understanding in speaking with an FBI instructor why the FBI chose 9mm. It wasn't because the 9mm was better than the 40SW in terminal ballistic tests, it was because it was easier to hit the target. And hitting the target was better at stopping the threat, regardless of caliber, than missing. I agree. But I also agree that the more energy and damage you can inflict on the target is also beneficial. Assuming you can effectively place hits on a target with any of these calibers, or others, why would you limit yourself to the weakest one? Not bashing the 9mm, I occasionally carry it, just that if I have to pull out my pistol, I or someone I love is in jeopardy of dying. It's that serious. I want every advantage on my side, including the biggest, baddest, meanest, most damaging bullet I can get and that's typically not a 9mm.

I was thinking the same after I posted, but as you stated about the 9's, I have full faith in the little 9mm load I put together for Wifes P365, the Barnes 125gr HP at an easy for her to shoot 1100 fps is an ugly little buzzsaw JWP.

Underwood loads 125 grain JHP in 357 sig that crono results on youtube are going 1500+ FPS. At that speed I can assure you that the wound channel will be impressive. I would expect the 357 sig at 1500+ FPS would be at the top of effectiveness

The 125 grain JHP points made for the 357 sig do not over expand and under penetrate like the +P+ 124 grain JHP in 9mm do

Those would be wreckers for sure, not to mention a different kind of wound channel, I run the 140gr Lehigh penetrators to 1500 fps in my 10mm, and the 200's in my 45 ACP to 1055 fps, made up some tough homemade media bullet testing boxes as identical as I could, complete with hard packed Wife magazines and cow bones, would you believe the 45 ACP round penetrated as deep as the 10mm and had a larger wound channel? with no expansion from either.

I know, I know, some may find that stupid, but I had time, and plus, there's a black bear and wild boar hog on my trail cam damn near as tall as a 4ft cattle panel at the shoulders, I did NOT want to run into either sneaking up that mountain in the dark with wind in my face and a bow in my hand, the copper and bonded hp's may be fine in a lot of cases, but, if I surprised either in the dark I had the idea of drilling deep enough holes in either to get them to leave me alone, and all would most likely be going in on frontal chest shots, so they would damn well need to go deep!, iirc most animal charges are from being surprised by two leggers.

I know that a 45 ACP 230 grain XTP at 1100 FPS will penetrate just as deep as the 180 grain XTP @ 1300 FPS in 10mm and leaves a larger wound channel.

Absent a recovered bullet, no credible ME is going to speculate what caliber, bullet style or or even type of firearm was used. This is solely about their unwillingness to speculate. They know the difference between big holes and little ones.

They will describe the hole(s) in the hide, the hole(s) through internal organs and membranes and the general direction of travel inside the body. These holes are typical described as 'defects' with a diameter expressed in imperial or metric. The primary and secondary conditions related to the cause death (hemorrhaging etc) will be described.

The reports, photos and physical evidence go back to the agency with jurisdiction for interpretation and usually, follow-ups. That interpretation, by people with decades of experience, is correct more often than not.

If they can't get the interpretation right 100% of the time, small wonder the internet makes such a mess of it,

That makes sense.

The other part is 6 out of 7 shootings with a handgun are not lethal. Me I would take the ability to fire the gun accurately over bullet diameter as long as penetration was the same. If 12-13 inches of penetration is available from a .35 inch diameter bullet then .45 inch or .1 inch difference in diameter is not significant, provided velocity and penetration were similar.

Handgun wounds not being lethal is mainly due to modern trauma care. If they get you there alive within an hour, they can almost always save you.

What are you basing that on?

The 6/7 statistic means nothing without knowing where the 7 hits were at.

5.7.

I have a little trouble with that with myself. I'd say between 40% to 50% fatality rate based on what I've seen. I'm also sure my experience is different from the surgeon who came up with 1 in seven. People who were shot and died well before being discovered aren't going to any emergency room, and they're just as dead as the folks who went to one and didn't make it.

Good point.

In the not a few shootings I’ve seen with 9mm Gold Dots, everyone hit properly has died.