Falmoth Rod & Gun Club Closed by Police

[Maine CWP Training]

FROM A RELIABLE SOURCE- Paul: Just a heads up. Falmouth R&G has been closed, hopefully only temporarily, because a disgruntled member and another abutter claim they have found bullets on their property. This is the same scenario that closed Royal River a few years ago...

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Safety violations shut Falmouth Rod & Gun Club

Mar 30, 2011

FALMOUTH — The Falmouth Rod & Gun Club has temporarily closed all four of its shooting ranges after safety problems were discovered during recent town inspections of the facility.

The shutdown comes after several neighbors complained that the club's rifle, trap and pistol ranges, which were built by the U.S. military in the 1940s, are unsafe, and after police determined the club has been operating without a permit since the mid-1990s.

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[Felix]

After reading that article you linked to in The Forecaster, sounds to me like there may be legitimate safety concerns rather than merely a disgruntled neighbor or two.

Probably won't be a cheap fix but I'd suspect some robust backstopping will alleviate most concerns and get the club back in operation.

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Who in their right mind would situate a snowmobile trail and a home 100' & 150' from the range in sight of the firing line located in the 1940's?

[Felix]

Who in their right mind would situate a snowmobile trail and a home 100' & 150' from the range in sight of the firing line located in the 1940's?

Common sense would say you're right; OTOH, it's the club's responsibility to ensure firing range bullets (court cases have widened that interpretation to include errant bullets) are properly backstopped and don't leave the club's property line.

Being no lawyer though, I don't know how much grandfathering might be allowed but I doubt it would trump public safety concerns. The club will have to find a way to ensure shooters' expended bullets are contained within the confines of the club's property. Come on now, the club can't realistically expect it would be OK for members' expended bullets to exit their physical property and enter privately-/publicly-held lands beyond without being challenged. Actually, I'm surprised the club's liability insurance company has continued to provide affordable coverage if this report is correct and factual that a code enforcement official has flagged the facility as having "serious safety concerns."

I don't see this situation as being much different from urban encroachment on long-established airports. And in most cases, the airports have come up the losers in these noise abatement battles. They've been forced to buy up additional land along the approach/departure corridors at great expense, have had to implement (often unusual) approach/departure routing patterns to reduce the noise footprints and in some cases had to restrict particularly noisy airplanes from operating out of the airport. By and large the courts have turned a deaf ear to claims of 'we were there first'...whether airport noise, nauseous fumes from a chemical plant or animal feedlot or bullets exceeding the property bounds of a firing range.

[Maine CWP Training]

the club will have to find a way to ensure shooters' expended bullets are contained within the confines of the club's property.

agree 100%

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JULY 2011 UPDATE