"Paul J. Adam" wrote:

In message , Krztalizer
writes
Obviously you haven't watched an aircraft fire a cannon into the air at
night.
Basically, it looks like a little chain of pearls and yes its quite visible
from a ways off.

Is that tracer?

Nope - just big blobs of 20mm dancing off into the night. No tracer in the USN
A-7s and F-14s that I have seen shoot at night - the A-7 guy emptied his gun at
the moon in preparation for a night belly landing and we could clearly see each
individual 20mm in the long chain of shots. Quite dramatic, actually.

Wouldn't have guessed it - thanks for the info. (I was watching a 30mm
trial recently and while I could spot the vortex trail left by the
shells when I knew exactly where and when to look, in daylight the
shells were quite invisible if the tracer didn't function)

Me too, if it had been most any other than who it was I'd have
moved on...I know you can see the shock wave(?) of a .303 bullet
on a rifle range while looking through a 'spotting scope' (from
the shooter's position) but unless it's a tracer you cannot see
anything (day or night) with your unassisted sight. Gordon,
you're certain that that wasn't tracer are you?.
--

-Gord.