An Arizona man has been arrested for unlawfully discharging a firearm, telling police that he was trying to shoot the moon.

39-year-old Cameron Read took a more literal approach to the phrase 'shoot for the moon', but given that bullets only travel about 4000 feet into the air when shot directly upwards, he was some 1.2 billion feet short of hitting the Earth's satellite.

Prescott Valley police responded to a call from a woman who reported that her boyfriend had fired several shots from a handgun and was still armed on Friday night.

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She and her teenage son told the authorities that Read was talking about seeing Halley's Comet before he began firing out of the window.

The pair heard several more shots before fleeing.

Police say Read has been booked into the Yavapai County Jail on suspicion of felony counts of unlawful discharge of a firearm, resisting arrest, disorderly conduct and endangerment plus misdemeanor criminal damage, and does not yet have an attorney.