{"id":600857,"date":"2026-04-11T22:17:14","date_gmt":"2026-04-11T22:17:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/600857\/"},"modified":"2026-04-11T22:17:14","modified_gmt":"2026-04-11T22:17:14","slug":"human-cannonball-continues-family-tradition-at-sydney-royal-easter-show","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/600857\/","title":{"rendered":"Human cannonball continues family tradition at Sydney Royal Easter Show"},"content":{"rendered":"

For David “The Bullet” Smith, life as a human cannonball was almost inevitable.<\/p>\n

He spent his childhood watching his father, David Smith Sr, being shot out of a cannon.<\/p>\n

“My mum and dad ran away to the circus after college, my dad was a top level gymnast and he’s always been a builder of strange things,” Mr Smith said.<\/p>\n

“He always says he laid awake for a year designing his first human cannon and that was eight cannons ago.<\/p>\n

“I was about 12 years old when he brought home the first Guinness World Record for the farthest cannonball shot.”\"A<\/p>\n

David’s parents, David and Jeannie Smith (left), joined the circus after college. (Supplied: David Smith)<\/p>\n

Teen cannonball<\/p>\n

Mr Smith was first shot out of a cannon in his family’s Oregon front yard when he was 17, but it wasn’t until two years later that he officially entered into the family business.<\/p>\n

“I was out doing my own thing and I was in North Carolina at the time with my friend.<\/p>\n

“I came home to a message on the answering machine that said, ‘Hey son, this is the old man, I hurt my back, I need you to come fill in for me, you start on Wednesday.’<\/p>\n

“I was a cannonball three days later.”\"A<\/p>\n

David “The Bullet” Smith performed at this year’s Sydney Royal Easter Show. (ABC Mid North Coast: Lauren Bohane)<\/p>\n

Mr Smith said while he was initially unsure whether he wanted to be a human cannonball, it was always the path he was going to follow.<\/p>\n

“If Dad says you do something, you do that, so it was never a question of whether I was going to do it or not.<\/p>\n

“I think he faked the injury anyway now, I think he just was suckering me into this job.<\/p>\n

“I’m glad he did because it’s taken me all over the world and it’s been such an amazing adventure.”<\/p>\n

Decades later, Mr Smith now holds the Guinness World Record for both the farthest and highest human cannonball shot at 198 feet and 89 feet respectively.<\/p>\n

Life as a cannonball<\/p>\n

Tens of thousands of people watched Mr Smith get shot out of a cannon at this year’s Sydney Royal Easter Show, and as spectacular as the performances were, he said it was all a very calculated process.<\/p>\n

“It becomes a very scientific process, mathematical equations going [on] to make sure the cannon does what it’s supposed to do.<\/p>\n

“I’m picking angles based on effects outside, [like] the wind.”<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

David “The Bullet” Smith being shot out of a cannon at the 2026 Sydney Royal Easter Show. (Supplied: Sydney Royal Easter Show)<\/p>\n

As for being shot out of the cannon, Mr Smith said there was “no feeling like it in the world”.<\/p>\n

“Being in the cannon itself is one of the most intense environments imaginable \u2026 I’m all the way down in the bottom of the cannon, if I look up, I see a little hole in the sky,” he said.<\/p>\n

“By the time my eyes and my mind know that the cannon went off, I’m already out of it.<\/p>\n

“It’s half a second, 10 times the force of gravity, either you’re ready or you weren’t.”<\/p>\n

Carrying on tradition<\/p>\n

As a second generation human cannonball, Mr Smith hopes his son and daughter, both in their late teens, will carry on the family tradition.<\/p>\n

“I think they’re going to do it, they’ve got to at least do it a few times to make that decision,” he said.<\/p>\n

“It’s very difficult for me to keep them from experiencing that if they want to do it.”<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

David is following in the footsteps of his father, David Smith Sr. (Supplied: David Smith)<\/p>\n

Mr Smith said while it was an unpredictable life, he would not trade it for anything.<\/p>\n

“There’s no routine, it’s just if you’re up for the adventure and love the thrill of the crowd, then that’s why I’m here.<\/p>\n

“I don’t know how you could ever get a greater experience in the world than what I’ve been blessed with.<\/p>\n

“It’s worth every injury and every scary moment.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For David “The Bullet” Smith, life as a human cannonball was almost inevitable. He spent his childhood watching…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":600858,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[64,63,292856,292855,6342,2349,85,148231,283799],"class_list":{"0":"post-600857","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-cannonball","11":"tag-human-cannonball","12":"tag-performance","13":"tag-show","14":"tag-sports","15":"tag-stunt","16":"tag-sydney-royal-easter-show"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/600857","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=600857"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/600857\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/600858"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=600857"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=600857"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=600857"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}