I would think there would be nothing, what with the lack of oxygen preventing any explosion from taking place which is what propels the bullet in the first place. I have researched the matter, and I have been bested, OH HOW I HATE BEING WRONG!

Taken from: http://ask.yahoo.com/20060726.html "Ah, an inquiry that warms the hearts of gun-toting physicists. The peacenik response might be...nothing. A gun cartridge holds the bullet or metal tip and the gunpowder (yup, they still use that stuff). The latter requires a spark, a nifty chemical reaction that involves oxygen, which tends to be sorely lacking in space. However, forward-thinking manufacturers have packed an oxidizer within the bullet casing. Whether that's sufficient for an explosive launch is up for much debate. That doesn't satisfy our bloodlust, does it? We'll assume we can send the bullet on its merry way with the proper gun. The scenario then conjures up the classic physics poser of shooting the monkey. Since we find shooting a cute primate abhorrent, we'll sub in the garden gnome. Where you're standing when you execute this maneuver, such as within a planet's gravitational pull, would affect the bullet's speed and path. As long as your aim is true, the bullet would travel a straight line (aka Newton's first law of motion) until some sort of force or object impedes it. Meanwhile, the recoil (Newton's third law) has pushed you back with an equal and opposite force. The next question is, can you fire off another shot? A regular old earth gun likely won't cotton to its new environment and may seize up, blow up, or do something equally annoying. Plus, we've littered space with enough dangerous debris already, do we really need to have bullets go flying?"

hope fully it wont come back do th earth and kill some one but there is a good change of it staying up there

In fact, the gun would fire exactly as it would in an atmosphere. Oxygen does not and NEVER HAS played ANY role in the explosion of gunpowder. Black powder - the original form of gunpowder, is a mixture of 3 things - carbon, sulphur, and either sodium or potassium nitrate. Carbon and sulphur are each BEGRUDGINGLY flammable. If you've ever lit a charcoal grill, you know what I mean by begrudgingly. Sulphur is a little less begrudging. But that is what they do in a mere 21% oxygen, diffusely around it at atmospheric pressure. Potassium nitrate takes the place of oxygen. It is an oxidizing agent. Gunpowder is thus a solid MIXTURE of an oxidizing and a reducing agent. Rather like having a tank full of a mixture of oxygen AND hydrogen gas. Or liquified oxygen and hydrogen (VERY bad idea, by the way. Kids, don't try at home). It needs no exterior substances whatsoever. All it needs is a tiny, tiny little excitation and then all hell breaks loose. If you mix hydrogen and fluorine, it doesn't even need to be an actual spark. Just ordinary visible light will do! With gunpowder, it's a little more stable, but the fact is that you have an oxidizing agent AND a reducing agent MIXED together AND in DENSE, SOLID FORM. It is a recipe for disaster and oxygen from air around it plays as much a role in its explosion as Earth's gravity plays a role in the acceleration you feel the moment you crash your car into a steel wall at two hundred miles an hour. In other words, not a lot. With a gun in space, however, you would have a nifty little means of propulsion, within limits. Particularly if you had a LOT of bullets.

I believe if you pulled the gun out(from the oxygen rich environment of your space suit or capsule) the bullet would not leak it's oxygen out if you were fast enough (assuming you had the type of cartridge that needed oxygen, and were not using a jet bullet, or one that had it's own oxygenate, or even if you did have those types) your moon scenerio is mostly correct, except it would most probably not fly 6 times faster. It would come out faster without the resistance of air pressure, but clearly not 6x, though you are absolutely correct that it would go 6 times farther at least due to the gravitation affects, and even greater would be the affect of the lack of atmospheric resistance than on earth, and perhaps even millions of times farther if it reached escape volocity, assuming you did not point the barrel down. But in space was the question I think. I do like your scenerio because moon men are much more likely to anger me than space men, because we claimed the moon in 1969 and they have no right to be there!

Donald Duck shoots a shotgun in space in a Disney educational cartoon of the 1950s, in order to illustrate the principle of rocket propulsion. If you're just floating around when you fire the gun, then the recoil of the gun (according to Newton's Laws, as pointed out by superpanda2 above) will kick you backward opposite the direction that the bullet flies. If you fire repeatedly, the series of recoils amount to a steady backward force. This is analogous to the thrust of a rocket motor that results from shooting high-velocity gas molecules (instead of bullets) out the nozzle.

Much the same as would happen on earth. The cartridge would explode as on earth, because it has its oxidizer in with it. The bullet would emerge from the gun fractionally faster than it would on earth because it has no air resistance. If you were not in orbit, it would then disappear at an effectively constant velocity, never to be seen again. If you were in orbit around a reasonably massive body, it would assume its own orbit which would depend on the muzzle velocity and the direction you pointed the gun. You would have to be slightly careful, because whatever orbit assumed would intersect your orbit, so thate is a tiny possibility that it could come back, still at the same speed, and hit you - so you would have shot yourself.

My thinking says that if you were just plain out in space with a gun and all the space equipment, and you decided to shoot the gun you and the shot fired will fly forever, unless of course you were to be sucked in by some planet's gravitational pull. This would happen becuase there is no air to create friction on you and the shot. Intertia would simply carry you through thoudsands and thoudsands of miles.

The projectile will fall back to earth and possibly hurt someone or do property damage. Odd question.

Nothing, space is a vacum. Vacums have no air. Air is required to make sparks or fire. The explosion of the gunpowder is used to propell the bullet. Explosions require air.

you would fly back and the bullet stay still because thrust shoots a bullet but with no gravity the thrust would be reversed unless at super powerful porportions

i dont think you could even fire a gun in space. without oxegen would the powder even be able to ignite? thats the real question.

You would be arrested for public endangerment :)

I misunderstood this question, from the beginning. i had a senior moment. 2nd answer: Firing a weapon in outer space would send the projectile into orbit. the energy of the projectile would eventually expend itself and remain in outer space, probably indefinetely. If the projectile were to enter the earth's orbit, it would burn itself out before landing on earth. I do not believe this action has ever been attempted. the velocity of a projectile, in gravity-free outer space, would be uncountable, since earths gravity would play no part in slowing down the projectile.

You'd go one way and the bullet would go the other way. "For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction." The enclosed powder would fire and the force of the recoil (which you would absorb if you were "floating" in space) would send you backwards while the energy of the expanding gases from the power would send the projectile forward. No friction within the vacuum of space would propel both until another force stopped you.

It Shouldn't fire because ther would be no oxygen, and if you did manage to shoot it, it wouldn't sop until it got suck into a planets magnetic feild and crashes, if it doesn't melt by then

Why aren’t permanent magnets really permanent?

What would happen is that the bullet would go forever in a line unless acted on by a force such as gravity. Also u would be sent in the opposite direction of the bullet with the same amount of energy of the bullet as stated by newtons third law of motion. However there are problems with this scenario. One wouldnt be able to fire a gun in space because there is no oxygen for the gunpowder to react with. Some explosive would have to be used that carries its own oxygen with it on a moleculer level.

i think that if you take a gun to space period it would automaticlly blow up due to space pressure, the bullet will be under to much pressure.

The recoil from the weapon would either spin you around, push you backward abruptly, or make the weapon fly out of your hand, or all three.

The bullet would travel in a straightline infinitely untill and unless attracted by the gravitational force of any celestrial body.

it is my opinion given the ability to fire the weapon that the bulllet would travel indefinately or until impacted by an exterior force. The argument that has prompted me to this question was some feel in my office that due to recoil, your body would travel indefinately like the bullet. I feel that the recoil would have some affect on your body, but the energy from the recoil would disipate and continuous shots would be needed to keep traveling i.e. propulsion similiar to the space shuttle. Any thoughts to settle this debate.

There is no sound in space.

depends how close the microphone (or ear) is to the gun. If the microphone was right near the gun, it would definitely pick up a sound, but not very far away, perhaps only a meter or two, you would have a difficult time picking anything up, because the gas particles discharged from the gun would be quite rarefied at that distance.

It wouldn't.

no sound !!!

You need air to carry sound and there is no air in space. +5

remember that phrase. In space no one can hear you scream? thats also applicable to gun shots...

no sounds...sound waves need a media to be transferred...since, in space, there's no such medium...you'll have only the jerking...but no sound at all...

nothing sound wise

You probably wouldn't be able to hear it even if you could. That and the problem of the vaccuum of space not allowing for any ignition of the bullet or blank. It'd probably sound like a regular gunshot if you fired a gun off in a spaceship, but that'd not be advised for obvious safety concerns.

The Russians were the first to take a gun into space and what a gun! They bolted it onto the side of their space station. It didn't work out as the lack of gravity in space means the bullet cannot travel with much impact.

No gravity, limitless range

not sure

You would probably miss.

www.livescience.com/18588-shoot-gun-space.html

The bullit would keep on going until it gets attracted to some gravitational pull and slam into that object!

The casing holding the powder charge is independent of the effects of the lack of oxygen in space. once the primer is ignited the powder will ignite normally. The gas build up in the shell casing will be normal and will eject the bullet down the barrel. Depending on the direction the muzzle of the firearm is pointed will determine its travel. It will travel at the muzzle velocity until it hits something or burns up entering an atmosphere. That could be millions of billions of miles. If it were fired at the earth the bullet would burn up before it struck the earth.