A Sneak Peek At Saturday's Zombie Invasion

By: Rudy Mezzy - Email

Posted: Sat 3:15 PM, Jun 30, 2012

Click here for more information on Zombies in the Heartland.

The pandemic begins Saturday -- Zombies in Grand Island, nut no need to run or hide. It's part of a competition that will draw more than three hundred shooters.

Everett Deger, the Marketing Communications Manager for Hornady Manufacturing, a sponsor of the event, says, "We've got 12 individual bays where we're going to have 325 shooters compete for over $170,000 in prizes. Competitors will compete in both speed and accuracy on all of the stages for the prizes and the person who shoots the most accurately and competes the fastest is going to be the victor."

To make the event more authentic, officials have called in the troops.

Nebraska National Guard Staff Sergeant James Dinville says, "We brought a couple Humvees out and we're just having a presence. We're part of the sponsors for Zombies in the Heartland and for the overall shoot, we're providing static displays of military vehicles, a helicopter -- a black hawk will be coming out."

But the question still remains: Why zombies?

"I don't know," says Dinville, "it's kind of something that's kind of taken off in the U.S. and with the younger generation. It's kind of something that's just appealed and with Hornady putting out new Zombie Max bullets, it's kind of perfect."

Deger says, "Well, zombies have been something that have been very very very attractive over the last couple years. A lot of people found our ammunition to be a lot of fun. The zombies are all of the targets that you'll see back here, the steel silhouettes and then there's also some clothed figures."

Though all competing slots have been filled, you can still come out to the Heartland Public Shooting Park and watch competitors shoot down the living dead.

"This is open to the public," Says Deger, "this Three Gun Match, which involves semi-automatic, shotguns and rifles, is very very very competitive and we hope that a lot of the public will come out and watch and hope to get involved in the future."