Sniper's kill from 1.28 miles away, new computerized scope in 2011

Joseph Goldstein:

If the Taliban fighters had bothered to look up, they would have seen small white nicks on the face of the boulder behind them. Nicholas Ranstad had been using it for target practice.

But they didn't notice. Ranstad could take his time.

It was January of 2008. For months, Ranstad, a 28-year-old Army specialist from Florida, had lived in a small hut 1.28 miles away from the rock with a group of snipers. Part of their mission was to keep an eye on a road crew working in this corner of Kunar province, in northeastern Afghanistan. The Taliban was executing the laborers to discourage any Afghan from cooperating with American-supported construction.

Ranstad had been shooting at the boulder and other natural targets in the ravine. For each shot, he'd jot down each variable - the wind, temperature, time of day and accuracy - in a spiral notepad snipers called the "dope book."

Through the scope, Ranstad could see the four Taliban, all armed and wearing masks. One man remained in the open, while the other three took momentary cover behind other nearby boulders.

Lying prone on the top of the small hut, Ranstad aimed at the man in the open. The distance was immense. While snipers in Afghanistan were routinely shooting at targets 800 to 1,000 yards away, this shot was well over twice that. At 6,775 feet away - about the distance from the Empire State Building to the bottom edge of Central Park - the man was beyond the adjustable range of Ranstad's scope. He hovered in the bottom sliver of Ranstad's view, a tiny figure, about two fingernails tall.

Using Ranstad's dope book, Ranstad's spotter Alex Simpson told him the distance to the target. Simpson peered through his single-eye spotter scope, examining the heat signatures off the ground.

"Winds, 3, left to right," Simpson said. Ranstad didn't say a word as he listened. He focused on keeping his Barrett .50 caliber rifle perfectly still.

"The biggest thing before shooting is to slow your heart rate down," Ranstad told The Post last week. "You want to be comfortable. I'm taking slow, deep breaths."

Beat.

"It's almost like a meditation. I'm not thinking of anything. I'm just ready to take that guy out."

Beat.

"Send it," Simpson said.

Beat.

Ranstad pulled the trigger before Simpson finished the order.

Then he waited.

Even traveling at nearly 3,000-feet per second out of the barrel, the bullet would take a couple of seconds to hit its target. He saw a trail of dirt about five or six feet below the target. A near miss.

"Damn it!" Ranstad thought. "What's wrong with you?"

"I go into every shot expecting to kill," he recalled. "I was aggravated with myself for about a tenth of a second. But you can't shoot angry or with anxiety."

Through the scope, Ranstad could see that the Taliban had no idea where the bullet had come from. They scrambled aimlessly. The man the shot had missed now slipped behind the large boulder. But one of the other four suddenly came forward. Confused about the origins of the bullet, the enemy fighter had left his protected position.

Simpson called out the correction as Ranstad aimed at the new target. He fired.

The seconds seemed like days, but his patience was rewarded.

"I had the chance to see him roll down the hill."

Ranstad later heard through the sniper grapevine that the shot was the longest by an American sniper in Afghanistan - and wasn't too far from the 7,972 foot kill in 2002 by Canadian Army Cpl. Rob Furlong. Since Ranstad's kill, a British soldier, Craig Harrison set a new distance record when he shot two Taliban from 8,120 feet last year.

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There is much more.

Snipers are important to the war effort in Afghanistan, because the enemy tends to operate at long range to avoid contact with US troops. The enemy is still in range of the sniper rifles particularly the Barrett .50 caliber which is probably the most potent sniper rifle in the world. There are smaller and lighter sniper weapons, but most do not have the range of the heavy Barrett.

Darpa and Lockheed-Martin are working on a new scope to enhance the ability of Snipers to get a kill with their first shot which uses a computer and laser in the scope to compensate for the usual variables including wind and elevation. It is supposed to be ready next year.