RE: Is this possible? Or am I mistaken?
It's quite possible the loud pop you heard with the 1/4 away shot was the arrow hitting the shoulder blade which deflected the arrow up through his shoulder a little ways. Those shoulder blades can easily stop an arrow from penetrating the vitals. Just an idea.
It is amazing what those animals can survive. Last year I hit a doe a little lower than that, waited 3 hours and went tracking. A little blood and hair where I shot her. I picked up a small blood trail about 20 yards away that got heavier over the next 50 yards where I found a spot that she had bedded down in. It looked like someone had poured out a 5 gal. bucket of blood. I knew I was mere feet away from finding my dead prize. Over the next9 hours and up to 1/2 mile away at some points I never found another drop![:@]