Grizzly Encounter While Elk Hunting

Have you actually ever seen anyone or anything shot in the brain. I have. I have seen brain shot animals go down immediately, and seen some continue on for quite a distance with dead shot accuracy to center mass of the brain. Once upon a time, I also worked in a hospital on the security staff and was assigned to watch a patient who had been shot. I saw his x-rays; he had been shot in the head at very closel range with a fairly large caliber handgun, one shot (looked to me like a 45). The bullet split in two, piece of it more or less traveling directly back and staying in about the center of his brain, the other fragment (really about 1/2 the bullet) traveled into the stem at the base of the brain. I worked at least 8 hours in the ER that day watching this guy and it may have been a 10 hour shift. During that time this man was fully, I repeat fully, cognizant of what was going on around him. At one point he began to scream in Spanish at me. I told him I did not understand Spanish and he immediately switched to English begging me to get a doctor to help him, and telling me of his pain. He was crying becuase to him it seemed as if no one would help. He had already been in the ER for hours at that point, and he was right, basically no one was treating him. The ER staff had no knowledge of what to do to help him, they had called on experts to assist, and the experts were in route but not there already. So he lay there on the hospital bed in the ER because they had stabilized him and no available doctor in NYC would operate on him. One expert was called back from a skiing trip in Switzerland but it would be almost a 1/2 day before he arrived.

I do not remember for sure what hapened to this man. I stopped working there very soon afterwards, but if memory serves me right he did die becuase of the injuries. The thing is though that he was alive for all of my shift. So no, brain shots and other traumatic and catastrophic brain injuries do not always kill instantly, nor do they even always kill. There are numerous records of traumatic brain injuries from which the victims survived.

As to the 44 for a backup in bear country, that was a good choice. You would, in my opinion, have to be nuts to carry a 9mm expecting to use it against a Grizzly Bear. You would, also in my opinion, have to be a bit looney to expect that you would get a shot directly into the open mouth of such a bear with that 9mm - really far out looney. I hope you are not suggesting such because as much as we disagree I never really thought you were bonkers.
Of course chances are if you shoot an animal in the brain it will go down, but don't bet on it when your life is at stake. Keep shooting till the threat has passed.