“SST, Inc., today announced the launch of its National Gunfire Index which offers the most detailed record available of illegal gunfire activity, including non-homicide firearm violence, in major cities across the United States. This previously unattainable data on gunfire activity provides a more comprehensive data set than has ever been available on the true volume, nature, and impact of the gun violence issue because it tracks all outdoor gunfire incidents in the areas sampled—and not only those that result in homicide, gunshot wound, or self-inflicted death. These data are especially relevant amidst the current federal mandate calling for increased analysis and research of the gunfire violence epidemic. SST collected and analyzed the data from a statistical sample of the more than 70 cities nationwide where SST’s ShotSpotter® Flex℠ gunfire alert and analysis solution is currently deployed by law enforcement agencies…In the announcement of this new index, SST is releasing results from its first two quarters’ indices (Q1 and Q2 2013), which can be found at www.shotspotter.com/ngi. A sample of data points include:

• In cities which were covered during both 1Q and 2Q, the number of incidents rose from 7,584 during 1Q to 11,174 during 2Q, an increase of 47.3%.
• A total of 32,117 rounds were fired in these 11,174 incidents, an increase of 5,500 or 21% over 1Q. On average, 2.8 rounds were fired per incident. One single incident included 40 rounds fired by a fully automatic weapon. It occurred at 01:00 local time early on the morning of June 11, 2013. The weapon fired all 40 rounds in just 2.26 seconds.
• The city with the highest rate of gunfire during this period experienced an average of 417 gunfire incidents in a single square mile area during 2Q. This city’s gunfire rate per square mile was 4.3 times higher than the average number of rounds fired per square mile of 98 within the sample.”