Firing Range Accidents or Incidents

[worshipviolin]

Have you had any accidents or incidents while at the range? I'd like to hear your stories. Here's a recent incident that happened to me.

A few days ago I was at the firing range shooting my Ruger SR9C. Everything was going normal. I was constantly getting pounded in the head by the usual spent casings that were bouncing off of the barrier to my right. All of a sudden, I was hit in the right temple by what felt like a rock. I knew that this wasn't the normal smack in the head by a casing. It was much harder of a blow. There was a sharp, burning pain. I laid my gun aside and felt of my temple. I could feel a peice of metal sticking out of my skin. I looked at my finger and saw blood all over my finger. I then went to the rest room, and, upon looking in the mirror, I could see the metal sticking out. For the life of me, I could not manage to grab it and pull it out. I decided to go home and fish this thing out of my head. It never occured to me that the guys at the range probably had tweezers or neddle nose pliars there.

At home I had a very hard time, even with tweezers, getting that peice of metal out of my head. It hurt like crazy. It burned like it had pepper all over it. It looked like a small peice of slightly twisted steel. It definitely was not lead or a peice of the brass casing that I had fired. I stipped my gun down, and I could not find a single thing wrong in the gun. The gun was perfect with no peices broken off of it anywhere. I still have no clue what that thing was or where it came from. It hit me from the right side, and if it had been one inch lower it would have gone behind my glasses... straight into my eye.

There was a person to the right of me who was shooting. I wondered if they might have hit one of the arms holding their target, sending a peice of it my way. But, with the barrier between us, I don't see how I got hit at that angle. This mystery goes unsolved.

Here's a video of someone's unfortunate range accident: Warning: There is some lanuage used by the victim.

[SFC]

Not me, but I was at a competition in kalifornia years ago when the Glock became very popular. I was two shooters down from this one shooter who reholstered his Glock with his finger on the trigger. He was lucky it was a 9mm and not a .45 as the bullet went through ankle and foot, doctors told him he was very lucky as he would not lose the use of his right foot and ankle, although, it would take many months of rehab. The competition continued on about three hours later after the paramedics and police left.

[worshipviolin]

Wow! I just happened to watch the next video after the "I shot myself" one played. Check it out. It is quite disturbing. Not all of it is at a firing range, but gee whiz.... How did the baby get the gun? And, did the accidental shot from the police lady hit the guy on the ground or the other policeman, or did it miss? I bet that visions of her final paycheck and a lawyer flashed before her eyes as she holstered that gun.

Here it is:

[Rich M]

Well, I dont have any personal story but this was in the morning news.

Officers shot at Auburn shooting range: Officers shot at Auburn shooting range | KING5.com Seattle


by KING 5 News
Posted on July 14, 2011 at 8:01 PM

AUBURN, Wash. – Two police officers were taken to the hospital Thursday after accidentally being shot by another officer.

It happened just before 5 p.m. at the Auburn police shooting range. Officers from numerous agencies were there at the time.

Auburn police said a gun was accidentally fired, hitting two officers. One was shot in the leg and taken to Harborview Medical Center. The other was shot in the abdomen and taken to Auburn Regional Hospital. Their wounds were not reported to be serious.

It wasn’t immediately known what agencies the officers were with.

[tnhawk]

My first experience on a firing range was at Ft Polk in 1969. In over 40 years of shooting, I can't recall an accident at a range.

[Grognard Gunny]

I had occasion at Gitmo, back in '79, in my duties as Range Safety Officer, to have a detachment of some 15 Marines, including a couple of Leutenants, out for a "Fam Fire" instructional course. (Oh. Did I mention that one of the LTs was a young lady?)

Anyway, after going through the safety and handling of the .45s, I put them on the "line" to bang away at targets. By the numbers; Mag in, slide home, come to raise pistol..... BANG! Said young lady had put one through the tin roofing over the firing line about 45 degrees up and forward of the line.

I yelled "Cease fire and freeze!" and walked down to where the shot had originated. The culprit was readily apparent, she had, at least, the grace to blush profusely! Instead of pulling an R. Lee Irmy routine on her, I simply made a show of looking carefully at the hole in the roofing and told her that the .45 was not a good weapon to use against aircraft and to keep her finger off the trigger until the sights were on target.

She steadied after that and the rest of the afternoon went unblemished.

Said young lady, incidently, went on to become an excellent Officer. She was "deep selected" for Captain a year or so later and become the first female CO of one of our field letter companies. We were stationed at LeJeune together for a couple of years (80-81), and she always came to me for advice when she needed guidance. I always like to think that some of my "training efforts and advice" helped her to become the Officer she became.

... and ain't that exactly what senior NCOs are supposed to do?

GG

[BC1]

Here's a video of someone's unfortunate range accident: Warning: There is some lanuage used by the victim.

This guy wants to implicate his holster in the mishap but he clearly has his finger on the trigger during the "pull" step. Absolutely human error.

[walther380]

Never had an accident at the range except for a .45 case finding its way to the bridge of my nose and cutting it. I thin kit was totally blamed on bad luck.