Stray Bullet Falls Through Tropicana Field Roof, Hits Fan

During a game against the Marlins two weekends ago, a Rays fan visiting from the Florida panhandle felt something strike his leg. It hit so hard, he thought it was a foul ball. But another fan nearby rooted around on the ground and c ame up with a bullet.

"No one really knows where that bullet came from," said St. Petersburg police spokesman Bill Proffitt. "It was a falling bullet. That's what it looks like."

The most likely culprit: celebratory skyward gunfire, that ritual common to the Middle East and American South.

The fan was not injured, only bruised, which allows police to surmise a few things. Because of its low speed, it would have had to have been fired almost straight up in the air—unlikely in, you know, a baseball stadium—or have hit something to slow it down. Their working theory is that someone shot into the air from within a few miles of the stadium, pierced the Trop dome, and landed, mostly harmlessly, on a random fan's thigh. The stadium was 52 percent full that night, so that's just some really bad luck.

[ Tampa Bay Times] H/T Casey