Craig Harrison (sniper)

Craig Harrison
Born	November 1974 (age 42) Cheltenham, Gloucestershire
Allegiance	United Kingdom
Service/branch	British Army
Rank	Corporal of Horse
Unit	Household Cavalry, Blues and Royals
Battles/wars	Afghanistan War Iraq War Bosnia

Craig Harrison (born November 1974) is a former Corporal of Horse (CoH) in the Blues and Royals, a cavalry regiment of the British Army, and as of November 2009^[update] holds the record for the longest confirmed sniper kill in combat, at a range of 2,475 m (2,707 yd). This exceeds the previous record of 2,430 m (2,657 yd) set by Rob Furlong in 2002. This record was certified by Guinness World Records. Craig Harrison is most famous for his military service in Afghanistan as a sniper but he also served in the British army in Iraq and the Balkans.

The first time Harrison ever used a sniper rifle was when firing an SVD (Dragunov) on a firing range near a British military base in Split, Croatia. In his autobiography The Longest Kill, Harrison described the SVD as looking like "an elongated AK" and after firing at a tree he says the SVD "practically split the tree in half".

In November 2009, Harrison consecutively struck two Taliban machine gunners south of Musa Qala in Helmand Province in Afghanistan at a range of 2,474 m (2,706 yd) using a L115A3 Long Range Rifle. In a BBC interview, Harrison reported it took about nine shots for him and his spotter to range the target. Then, he reported, his first shot "on target" was a killing shot followed consecutively by a kill shot on a second machine gunner. The bodies were later found by Afghan National Police looking to retrieve the weapon (which had already been removed). The first Taliban was shot in the gut and the other through the side. Later in the day an Apache helicopter hovered over the firing position, using its laser range finder to measure the distance to the machine-gun position, confirming it was the longest kill in history.

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