{"id":1537920,"date":"2025-05-24T20:55:00","date_gmt":"2025-05-25T00:55:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/?p=1537920"},"modified":"2025-05-24T20:55:00","modified_gmt":"2025-05-25T00:55:00","slug":"watch-army-suspends-rangers-after-they-fired-blanks-near-crowded-florida-beach","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/watch-army-suspends-rangers-after-they-fired-blanks-near-crowded-florida-beach\/1537920\/","title":{"rendered":"Watch: Army Suspends Rangers After They Fired Blanks Near Crowded Florida Beach"},"content":{"rendered":"

Watch: Army Suspends Rangers After They Fired Blanks Near Crowded Florida Beach<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

New viral video has emerged showing an incident near a beach and popular tourist island spot off Florida, which the US Army is now investigating. The unusual incident has quickly made national headlines.<\/p>\n

Eighteen soldiers with the\u00a06th Ranger Training Battalion were\u00a0temporarily suspended<\/strong> as instructors amid a formal inquiry into the May 16 incident, which involved some of them discharging their weapons at a public beach<\/strong>. Soldiers shot blanks into the air from a small tactical boat while closely surrounded by civilian boats.<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

The shots from machine guns caused enough of a scene for people nearby to call 911 – not realizing they were blanks. It all happened\u00a0at a crowded beach and boating area along Florida\u2019s Emerald Coast, and in one social media video a woman can be heard frantically asking whether real bullets were being fired<\/strong>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Many cars can also be seen in one video traversing a nearby bridge at a distance behind where the weapons discharges were happening aboard the Army boats.<\/p>\n

Apparently there was screaming and some bystanders ran for cover, thinking there was some kind of mass shooting incident. According to the NY Times<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Earlier that day, the Rangers had gone to a popular boating area several miles away, Crab Island, which is in Choctawhatchee Bay, and some fired blanks there, too, according to city officials.<\/em><\/p>\n

Video posted on social media<\/a>\u00a0showed two small boats with uniformed military personnel in a crowded area near other vessels carrying passengers as well as bathers in the water. In the video, at least one of the personnel fires into the air.<\/em><\/p>\n

It seems not every incident of shooting was caught on film, but other locations where blanks were fired may have caused more chaos among unsuspecting beach revelers.<\/p>\n

“Is this real?”<\/strong>\u00a0a woman exclaimed.<\/em><\/p>\n

18 US Army Rangers SHOOT blanks near crowded beach in Florida<\/p>\n

They have been suspended and are under investigation<\/p>\n

Real life Florida is becoming more and more like a GTA 6 trailer pic.twitter.com\/dSqFbVeFPM<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 RT (@RT_com) May 23, 2025<\/a><\/p>\n

“At least five calls reporting the gunfire came in to the Okaloosa County Sheriff\u2019s Office just before 3:30 p.m. on May 16, a spokeswoman said,”<\/strong> NY Times notes.<\/p>\n

A local city official said as follows: “What happened at Crab Island was not part of the\u00a0Billy Bowlegs Pirate Festival<\/a>, nor was it approved by either the City of Fort Walton Beach or the Billy Bowlegs organization.”<\/p>\n

The comment was based on speculation that the firing of blanks by the Army Rangers had been part of a large boating festival which involves mock gun battles and fireworks displays.<\/p>\n

NEW: 18 Army Rangers have reportedly been suspended for firing off blanks during the Billy Bowlegs Pirate Festival off Crab Island in Florida.<\/p>\n

Boaters and swimmers reportedly took cover at the sound of gunshots.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs part of Friday night\u2019s festival schedule, soldiers from the\u2026 pic.twitter.com\/mImn85LnT4<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) May 23, 2025<\/a><\/p>\n

“We take this situation seriously and are investigating,” an Army spokesperson has said. “The Army will ensure accountability based on the outcome of the investigation.”<\/p>\n

The large-scale suspension of the instructors, which is highly unusual, may actually delay a training program which had been ongoing.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Tyler Durden<\/a><\/span>
\nSat, 05\/24\/2025 – 16:55<\/span><\/p>\n

\u200bhttps:\/\/www.zerohedge.com\/military\/watch-army-suspends-rangers-after-they-fired-banks-crowded-florida-beach<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Watch: Army Suspends Rangers After They Fired Blanks Near Crowded Florida Beach New viral video has emerged showing an incident near a beach and popular…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":1537921,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1537920","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","wpcat-1-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1537920","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1537920"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1537920\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1537921"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1537920"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1537920"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1537920"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}