Range trip cancelled due to careless shooters.

[steamloco76]

Our club has a 50 foot indoor pistol range/meeting room with the same type of bullet stop as the OP. the top of the steel plate is visible where it hits the 9 foot high ceiling.

Recently we've seen multiple bullet strikes on the edge of the plate, into the ceiling tile and roof joists plus marks from strikes on the floor. Luckily none went through the roof. Our closed circuit monitoring showed a couple younger part time LEO members trying out their best video game moves with their pistols and pistol caliber carbine! They were running, then hook-sliding on the smooth concrete floor while shooting! Also practicing the tumble roll and come up shooting.
Their electronic buzz-in card time stamp along with the time on the footage identified them. We all thought it was someones kids until the club president checked the tape.

 

[Arik]

Re: Range trip cancelled thanks to careless shooters.

As much as im for safety and all i'll take my chances at an unsupervised range vs one with an RO. I'd rather become a anti gun lefty hippy if the only ranges were with RO. A little too nazi for me

Sent from my DROIDX using Tapatalk 2

 

[dswancutt]

It's a epidemic that afflicts all ranges. I started taking care of the rifle and pistol ranges at my club, mowing, picking up trash etc. All the steel target stands have holes in the supports, purposely done.
I built new pistol targets out of scrap 2x4 and about 2 months later, so jackwagon put a target up right on the corner, pissed me off. The latest trick has been shooting at them with shotguns so there is nothing to staple a target to.
When the snow melts, I will be putting up new centers

 

[2152hq]

I belonged to an indoor range for many years when i shot Bullseye.
It was a 50ft only for any caliber pistol (lead bullet only and no Magnum caliber brass), + 22rf rifle.

The backstop steel plates couldn't handle jacketed or fmj bullets w/o dimpling. That would send lead bullets back at the shooters if struck just right.
I caught a couple of those in the head while B/E shooting,,not a pleasant evening.

Anyway,,there were always holes in the ceiling,,holes in the side walls, in the benches,,ect. A 24hr/7day wk key card system was convenient, but being on your own made it easy for some to let the rules slide.

When they finally did put cameras in,,they found some of the violators of the rules were a few of the local constabulary officers shooting in the middle of the night.
Other members were involved too, but afraid of loosing memberships ($$),,the powers that be only issued warnings over and over again and never really did anything about the problem children.

The conditions got worse to the point where members volunteer work parties were asked for to come in & patch up the place and repair or replace the backstops on regular occasions.

With that I opted out of the OK Corral Range and I still have my eyesight to prove it.

Such nice convenient things always get ruined by a few.

 

[kamloops67]

sorry to hear about your range hillbilly, i want to come by for breakfast some time.
our club has a nice indoor shooting facility 60' long, 8 bays wide.there is always a r.o. on duty . if you cant hit your target you get sent to the outdoor range to practice!
new members are watched closely and still you can see evidence of unintended discharges or just poor marksmanship.
the top of our steel backstop is painted red and is monitored for misses if there are too many we start watching for the culprits .the r.o. on duty is kind of given the stink eye if it happens on his watch, because were supposed to watch for that sort of thing, safety being rule#1.
i brought a guest and his two kids one time .the boy about 12 had shot bb guns before and did ok with the handguns, his daughter a shy 16 year old young lady, was a crack shot! had never even held a gun before. it was awesome to behold!dad on the other hand was putting rounds about 4-5' over the targets removeing red paint at an alarming rate i was taken aside by r.o.on duty and was asked to keep an eye on my guests. after the session was over, i was shown where the ladder and red paint were kept.

 

[LVSteve]

Holes in the ceiling are often the result of those who double tap without knowing where the gun is pointed. These clowns have a beat in their head that drives their trigger finger rather than learning what works with the gun. I saw a review of a 9mm carbine where the author whined that his double taps were well off. Well DUH! The inertia in a carbine is totally different to shooting a pistol. Is the recoil cycle the same shooting a 9mm Shield as it is in a 9mm 1911?

 

[kennyb]

EVERY range has a few....

 

[rwsmith]

It doesn't matter what steps you take

You can put up all the steel plates you can but if somebody truly WANTS to do something stupid there is no stopping them.

 

[Poodle Soup]

This is why I shoot later at night or on sunday mornings. Range is empty just my girl friend and I. No worries and all the brass on the floor is mine that way!

 

[Bat Guano]

Although I am a member of the local club, their range has the dubious honor of an "accidental" shooting about 20 years back. A man plopped his cased--and loaded--shotgun on the roof of his car and when it "went off" it killed his wife standing on the other side. Sloppy and unsafe gun handling is still common at that facility. Scary at times.

I much prefer to shoot on a friend's acreage or off in the sagebrush. Better to keep an eye out for the odd rattlesnake than worry about getting shot.

 

[4011]

Should have seen the support beams across the PDs open top range.

 

[kamloops67]

we "sort of" close our indoor facility for the summer. no body wants to shoot indoors apparently. bs. i do, guess we got something to talk about at next meeting
whens breakfast again?

 

[YogiBear]

Aloha,

The Wife and I would love to join a Private Range, monitored or not.

Food is iceing on the cake.

Land enough to shoot on anytime is a dream

You guys have no idea how good you have things compared to here in Hawaii.

 

[MI-LPTroll]

There is a range by me that has had its outdoor rifle/pistol range shut down for over two years because of a bunch of idiot rent-a-cops from the university an hour away came out and were launching rounds over the backstops and trees and ended up hitting a couple houses (thankfully no one was in them at the time) a half-mile down the road in a sub-division. NRA came out and inspected it, made some recommendations for improvement, and then they (the gun club) just never followed through with it. Theyve lost a good deal of their members over their lack of ambition to do something. Really sucks when a stupid few can ruin a good thing for the rest of us, though that can be said for just about anything. :/

 

[bgrafsr]

I'll be joining another club in January that has 300, 200, 100, and a 50 yard range. They are building a 25 yard range now, and have a trap and skeet field, plus a 3D video archery shoot on a portion of the property. The looked into building a 10 lane, 50 or 75 foot indoor range and had the NRA help them with the design. When all was said and done it would have cost close to $650,000 to build, due to the safety and EPA regs.

 

[Gischileu]

One of the indoor clubs I was a member at locally had a problem mentioned above - no on duty range officer. They tried to monitor behavior via CCTV, but there was so much unsafe behavior, I let my membership lapse and joined a new club across town that DOES have a range safety officer on duty full time. I feel much better knowing someone is keeping an eye on those who haven't learned the rules, and will remove those who don't think the rules apply to them.

 

[zzzippper]

I packed up and drove to our range to find a "Closed Indefinately" sign on the gate. The night before a group was practicing tactical draws from their holsters and one shot himself in the leg with a Glock.

The range is owned by the company where I am stationed so they have to re-write their already extensive rules. With the company lawyers involved no one knows when or if it will re-open.

 

[Mickey D]

Sorry to hear of the carelessness. Sometime the nuts don't fall far on the range.

 

[Cattledog]

At our "local" range on Monday, older guy (70-ish same as me) at far left says "Range cold" and walks out to get his target. None of the three of us on the right side heard him, even though the one closest to him had electronic muffs.

When people yelled at him to get back he said "I said the range was cold" and continued to his target. I was loading another magazine and did not see him start on his urgent mission, I saw him about the same time as the guy next to me and we both yelled. No shots were fired, but the guy next to me said "That guy is a lot braver than I am!"

It is rare with 8 stations not to have someone actively shooting. The two stations to his right did hear or see him, but nobody else.

I packed up and left. The good news is that he will not be contributing to the gene pool due to his age. The bad news is, he already did.

 

[hangnoose]

SORRY TO HEAR IT

The days of common sense and being responsible and trustworthy are over. having an unsupervised 24-7 range with up to 5 guests at one time and a range that is NOT bullet proof 360 degrees and overhead was just asking for trouble IMO. a group could leave a bar at closing time, then go to the range with no supervision, or check in? It stinks but it could have certainly been much worse and very likely would have sooner or later. I think you guys got lucky. I hope your club can survive the changes and costs to modify. I'd imagine some big changes are coming.