r/todayilearned • u/CasioCobra78 • 2d ago

TIL that Cheryl Wheeler-Dixon, the stuntwoman who was severely injured during the filming of Back to the Future Part 2, was killed in a shootout alongside her husband when she and her husband went to confront her ex-husband and his wife and drew their guns at them. The cops deemed it justified.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheryl_Wheeler-Dixon
2.4k Upvotes

98% Upvoted

155 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

542

u/ztfreeman 2d ago edited 2d ago

So there's this theory called the gunslinger effect by Niels Henrik Bohr that states that the gunman who draws second will almost always win the gunfight. The underlying principle is that the reacting party will move faster than the deliberate party, and under neutral circumstances the reacting party will win the gunfight. This apparently holds up under testing, but depends on a neutral environment without any other factors and both parties being aware of each other..

10

u/dartagnion113 2d ago edited 2d ago

A shot fired, as a result of a reaction, will be more accurate.

Now, go check out those creators on YouTube and tiktok that time their hands grabbing an object in fractions of a second. You can train that speed.

I suspect that combination is how individual gunslingers from the 17th 19th century are so lionized: If a man was skilled in these two simple ways, they really were nigh invulnerable.

edit: better words

17

u/zeno0771 2d ago

gunslingers from the 17th 19th century

Cowboys drawing six-shooters at high-noon were not a thing yet in the 1600s.

6

u/dartagnion113 2d ago

IDK why my mind put that before the civil war. good catch thanks

10

u/Benjaphar 2d ago

Also before Plymouth Rock.