Tips From Emil Praslick On How To Determine Wind Direction

Windcalling. Essential for long range shooting, yet almost mythical in application. Without the aid of windage flags, or some other such illustrative implement, most have very little idea how to actually call wind with any requisite degree of accuracy. Luckily for us, Berger Bullets’ Emil Praslick, formerly a rifle coach of the U.S. Army Marksmanship Unit, an 18-time National and two-time World Champion coach, and a King of Two Miles Champion coach, has taken it upon himself to reveal a quick and easy way to determine wind direction. The video is featured on the Applied Ballistics Facebook page.

It can be done with a telescope, a riflescope, binoculars, or pretty much any form of magnified optical enhancement. On a hot day, it is easy to see what is commonly termed as “mirage” effect, where heatwaves are visible rising up into the air (particularly off a hot surface like asphalt, for example). When wind is blowing either right at you, or from right behind you, it turns out that it will cause the same effect. Thus in order to tell wind direction, simply pan around with your optic until the “boiling” effect appears. That will be the “no value” point of the wind, and you know it will either be blowing directly at you, or directly away from you at that exact angle.

So next time you’re making a long shot in breezy conditions, take a page from Praslick. You might just call it a little better than you did before. Windy conditions, after all, are Emil Praslick’s specialty.