If only Cheney had shot Chuck Roast instead of Harry Whittington

By Lee Russ

Saturday, February 25, 2006 at 04:34 PM

Lots of analysis has already gone into Cheney's shotting of Harry Whittington, but I haven't seen anything about trying to recreate the events as described by Cheney and the other witnesses.

But Thom Gunn undertook that dangerous task and describes the results in the Whidbey News Times.

Using a gun "a step larger than Cheney's" and which "shoots a shell packed with 25 percent more shot and powder," Gunn placed the re-creation victim, a chuck roast, exactly 30 yards away.  Although news claim Whittington was wearing, a fluorescent orange vest, a shirt and a light jacket, Gunn provided Chcuk Roast with only one shirt.

The results of shooting Chuck Roast: "Six pellets leave marks on the shirt, but only two enter the roast, and then only about one-eighth inch."

Compared to Whittington, who experienced birdshot "passing from Mr. Whittington's side through the sternum -- that's skin and blubber -- and into the heart muscle."

Read the original for his guess at what really happened.