How many people have seen bad range accidents? We were at an indoor range several years ago and one guy put a 5.56 into the foot of the guy in the next lane. As a doc I took a look at it. Actually didn't look that bad. Perforated a leather tennis shoe and sock.  Little hole in the top of his foot and a little bigger exit hole on the side where the round exited. The bullet hit a bone, shattered it and richocheted to the side. Lots of blood. The recovered bullet was in several pieces. The largest piece, the point of the bullet was bent. He made a complete recovery in 6-9 months.  Lost some range of motion in his foot.  Interesting scar.  For those interested, the round was a PMC 55 grainer.

Haven't seen any blood yet but I've seen some stupid shit.  People emptying shotguns (3 rounds) at one target, miss all three times and then slaming the gun down pointing it at everyone there...hope it was empty anyways....People loading up rifles behind the firing line and pointing them at everyone.....Brutal

ARDOC

Did you help get the AR out of the shooters A$$?

We had a guy at our club shoot his leg clean off with a 44 magnum revolver.  He was teaching his 12 year old nephew how to shoot it.  Now we all know that that is a heck of a gun for a young boy to shoot.  He simply could not hold the gun up as he was not strong enough.  When he dropped it to his side after he gave up shooting it, naturally it went off!!

On the bright side.....IT WAS AN ARTIFICAL LEG!!!

He had lost the original in a rail yard accident some years before.....needless to say he was a lucky SOB....the second time.

The guys were actually good buddies.  I put a pressure dressing on and the EMS guys took him to the hopsital for surgery.  I was very suprised.  The surgeons only debrided the wound and gave him IV antibiotics. I guess high velocity bullets pull in a lot bacteria into the wound.  He was in a cast for 6 weeks. PT for another 6 weeks.  The guy who pulled the trigger felt bad enough, no one had to do anything to him. The cops gave him a good going over and he lost his AR for a month. But they gave it back.  

Stormbringer, thats great.  Best place to get shot!  After you clean your underwear its kinda funny.

A few years back I was shooting in the indoor pistol range at the gun club I belong to.  A guy there was teaching his son, maybe 10 or 12 years old, how to use a revolver.  At one point the father was showing the son how the trigger, hammer, etc. work to fire the gun and thought the revolver was empty.  Well, it wasn't.  He was pointing it kind of sideways in my direction and to everyone's surprise, there was one live round left and the .38 went off....the round hit the wall about two feet in front of me, waist high.  It would've hit me in the left hip had I been two feet ahead of where I was.

Let's just say I was pissed.  The guy apologized profusely and went and reported what he did to the range master.  I just continued shooting, no sense letting a near death experience ruin my fun.  Heck, I ride a motorcycle, near death experiences are a daily occurence on a bike!

Luckily, nobody was hurt, but that is the closest I've ever seen somebody come to getting hurt at the range.  Too bad that somebody was me!

Worst one I ever saw, and I'll never forget it, is the poor SOB holding that Garand at the barrel with his left hand, and supporting at the receiver with his thumb while dancing the Whahtucy.

What made matters worse was that poor SOB was me.

I watched a guy try to sight in a Mossberg shot gun that he somehow managed to put a big 3x9 Leupold scope on, without extended eye relief. It was a slug gun and he was shooting 3" slugs. He was looking right in the scope as he touched it off. Tore the skin off his eyebrow right down to the bone, The skin, eyebrow and all was dangling over his right eye. The original bloody mess. He just packed up his stuff, got in his car and drove off. There were two of us watching the whole thing, our jaws were on the floor. We were flabbergasted.

5 years ago, a guy went to a local indoor range and rented a handgun and promptly commited suicide.

What a mess! Brain matter splatter all over the glass behind the idiot. The guys on either side of him were in shock.

While shooting at Calveton, NY a family (father and sons and cousins pulled up and piled out of a van. There was eight of them and they had one scoped rifle. It appeared to be a .308 or 30-06. After we hung targets the father cracked off a few rounds then one of the kids took up behind the rifle. Dad pointed out the parts, showed him how to shoulder the rifle and put a round in. I'm pretty sure he told the kid to take a shot. As he did so a few of the other kids started talkingand his attention was drawn away from his son or nephew behind the rifle. I looked at the kid and he had the his eye pressed right up against the scope. As there was a language barrier all I could do was make loud cautionary noises to dad, who quickly looked back at the kid and cautioned him against the placement of his eye. I guess the kid took a little advice, but not enough. He pushed the rifle about 3 inches from his face and let a shot go. The rifle sprung back and the scope hit him square in the forehead, leaving a perfectly circular, deep laceration and blood streaming down his face. They quickly threw a towel on his head, packed into the van and headed out(to the hospital I assume.)

"That's funny because it's happening to someone else."
                     Homer J. Simpson

One time I went shooting with this one guy who had just put a pistol grip on his Mossberg 590. After a few rounds from the hip and not being able to hit anything past 15 feet, he decided to try to use the bead sight. So he brings the shot gun up about 6" from his face and fires. The recoil the gun back straight into his mouth, shattering a front tooth. This guy already had a screw loose and just spit the fragments out and kept shooting the rest of the day. He even went out with us later that night to eat pizza.

Never saw any accidents, but every trip to my local indoor range is very entertaining.I live near a small city West of Philly and it seems our local gangbangers like to sharpen their 'bangin skills there .So far I haven't seen a single one that could shoot worth a damn.Of course they're more worried about shooting "style" than actually hitting paper.They will dump more ammo in 15 min.than I'll go thru in 2 hrs.and still be trying to hit the same target.I just hope if I'm ever involved in a gunfight, It'll be with one of these guys !!!

Didn't involve a gun, but saw a range attendant after he just picked up a rattle snake. He was eventually okay, but their were probably 20 people or so who had a different idea about how snakes down range should be handled.

I was in Basic Training at Ft. Benning in '80. We were zeroing our 16's for the 1st time. We had this smart*ss from NYC that knew EVERTHING about firearms. You can probably see where this is going already!

We were in the foxhole supported, he fires a few rds for 1st adj. Butterfly lands on front sight post. He is shooing for all he's worth. Butterfly won't un*ss the AO. He yanks back on rifle and thrusts forward his left hand...BANG...right through the palm. Don't know how he managed to get his hand that far in front of the FS, but he did. Much Ha Ha'ing was done in the barracks that night!

I took some Dutch friends to a range in here in Kentucky.  We had a blast, no pun intended.  They kept asking if my rifles were "legal"  they had a hard time beleiving that it was perfectly legal to shoot my AR and AK.  About an hour after we got there this guy shows up with a full-auto mac-10 with an extra bolt he had purchased.  As I was asking him about his weapon he switches bolts and  loads a magazine. Just when I think he is going to fire down range he turn 45 degrees to the right and empties the magazine into the bank at the side of the range. This idiot fired full-auto across our lane about 5 ft. in front of my group.

after reading all those sick blood spilling accidents, i dont feel like going shooting anymore [:(]

See? I knew you guys were dangerous.

OK, it's not a BAD range accident, but until the last time I was at Lytle Creek (the new range), I was the only firearms related injury.

About 2 years ago, I decided that my wife needed some extra capacity in her Remington 870.  I put on a mag extension, and we headed on up to Lytle Creek to test it out.  For about the first 30 or 40 rounds, it was doing fine.  All of a sudden, the follower and spring got caught up somewhere inside.  I wasn't sure why it was doing that, so I started tapping on the shell that was in the tube.  Tap, tap, tap... tap, tap, tap, woosh thunk...

The woosh was the spring finding out where it was stuck, getting loose, and shoving back at me.  The thunk was the shell headed for the carrier, and hitting my forefinger, trapping it SERIOUSLY inside the gun.  My wife was not happy with me at that point, but I wasn't all that happy either.  We finally had to call the rangemaster over, and we slowly worked the pump around until finally my finger popped out.  I don't know if it was the relief, or my body going slightly in shock, but I almost passed out right then and there.  

Needless to say, while I am one of the most safe shooters on the range (and they have commended me on that), they do give me a good deal of harrassment over that one incident.

There was about 20 of us in an advanced shotgun instructor class that lasted 5 days we shot 750+ full power slugs at paper and 1000+ 00 Buck full power at steel targets. Each of us were hit at least once drawing blood (superficial).

Was an extremely good course with lots of shooting.


Hunter out...

Stupidest thing I've seen done was by me when I was a little younger, not at a real range just out in the boonies. I had gone out that day just to practice with my new Auto-Ordnance 1911, well I had all my gear on top of my car and I was loading mags, I slapped one in on a locked open slide, hit the slide-stop lever, BLAM! tore a six-inch gash through the car-hood before hitting a crossbeam and stopping. Looked around a bit and found the shell, no fp dent in the primer but it was all weird and crushed looking I looked at the rest of the ammo and did find a few more not quite seated primers.
I got a bunch of Sh!t from people I work with about shooting my car to which I always replied "I didn't shoot it, it was blah blah" my mom even talked about a lawsuit (it was factory ammunition)I couldn't go through with that and eventually admitted to my mom, myself and the people at work, that whether or not I pulled the trigger (I didn't) I DID shoot my car because I ignored a major rule of gun safety.

I almost forgot about this one but the mention of black poweder brought it back to mind.  A few years ago our club was holding its anual Black powder sightin event prior to deer season.  There was a pair of brothers there that had just joined the club.  When the first one set off his....KABOOOOM!!  he was left holding the rear of the gun, the forestock  and the rest of the gun was GONE.  The barrrel was on the ground BLOW TO HECK... His brother laughed at him and said " thats what you get when you load double".  Before I could get over to stop him, he pulled his trigger!!  You guessed it >>>KABLOOOOIE!!!!
Needless to say they were sharing some "blackpowder" that they had hanging around the house....I think that it was Bullseye!!!!!
Neither was hurt to bad, just a few cuts from debris...LUCKY BASTAGES!!

The "accidental" nature of the following event is questionable but it happend in the range shop so it qualifies.

The teenage son of the range owner was frequently "employed" to manage business, do some reloading and other light work.  He was a rough one, enrolled in alternative school and hung out with the wrong crowd (read illegal drugs).  I frequently heard him making deals on the side, of course it was off-location but it still bothered me.  

The boy had a female friend who would on occasion, visit for purposes unknown.  She was probably either a dealer or user of drugs, none of which I can verify.  On one such visit, she picks up a loaded Sig 226, aims it at the boy and pulls the trigger, supposedly thinking the gun was not loaded.  It was and the boy was hit in the head.

The real tragedy was his parents did not know about the shooting until several hours had passed.  The stupid girl left, not knowing the severity of the wound.  By the time he was discovered, he was near death from loss of blood.  He lingered on for several hours in the hospital.  Had the female done the right respoonse to her actions, the boy might be alive today, be it in a reduced mental state.

If you load a gun, maintain posession of it!  Chances are, he loaded the gun and set it down on the counter.

At the 2000 ASLET conference in Richmond, VA I attended one class by the FBI. They were showing off their latest training aids for firearms instruction. Those of you that teach will remember or still use (I do) the front sight/rear sight cut out of something and either taped to a yard stick or placed on an overhead projector to demonstrate to the student how the patridge type sight is alligned and to show the normal movement we all experience while attempting to line up the sights on a target.

Well this one FBI instructor used to download his service pistol and have the student look at the sights from the muzzle end while he sighted in on the students eye (ever here 200 Officers groan all at once?) He used to do this in the firearms cleaning room at the academy. NO ammo was allowed into that room EVER. His coworker warned him numerous times about how this was a VERY bad idea. One day he was in the cleaning room with the students helping one overcome a shooting problem. He got called to the admin building and dutifully loaded his pistol when he left. Upon his return he forgot to download his pistol before he entered the cleaning room (are you feeling sick to your stomach yet?) He pulled out his pistol and performed his little trick. He shot the student at point blank range dead center of his left eye killing the student and blowing brains all over everyone behind him. Now I didn't witness this but the Agent that relayed this story to us was there and was his good friend. The emotion was there trust me.


Hunter out...

Was the instructor prosecuted for gross negligence?

The final disposition of the Agent was not discussed. I was impressed that the FBI was so forthcoming with the information in the intrests of preventing future tragedys to begin with and since the outcome of the Agent really didn't have any bearing on the mishap itself we did not ask.

Hunter out...

Two years ago I took a friend of mine shooting for the first time. We set up on the fifty yard range with a .22. The guy next to us was shooting some one else's reloads out of his .357. We are there three minutes when the revolver blows up sending one part of the cylinder into the shooter's arm making a nice quarter sized hole through it, and another part of the cylinder through the wooden side wall of the range. This scared the hell out of my friend because he was leaning agaist that wall and the hole was about 1/4 of an inch from his ear. He was picking splinters out of his ear for the rest of the day, but on the positive side, it really drove home all my points about safety.

Kyle

Well, I have never seen a real accident but now am having second thoughts about going to the range this weekend, though I have heard the wonderful zing of a .454 casull round downrange...the guy obviously didnt read the sign saying no 454's.  But when I am at the range, I see improper gun handling ALL the time.  I see people hit the slide release while its pointed sideways (at the person in the next booth) I always see people with their finger on the trigger the moment they pick up the gun, and my favorite (not dangerous, but funny as all hell) was this one guy who came to the range in his ferarri, and when he got in the range, he had a MK23, Wilson CQB (combat service grade) and a DE .50 AE.  3 of the most expensive fire arms you can get, and he sets up this silouette at like 10 yards, aiming for the head, and he couldnt hit it worth a damn with the MK23, complete with a nice laser sight on it too.  I was shooting my 92fs, put it out to 25, and was shooting at peices of paper with 2 inch circles on them, that I made at home.  put 9/10 shots through it, and the guy was like...hell, I've been shooting for 3 years and I cant even do that.  When he found out it was my first gun, and I had put about 1200 rounds through it, he packed up his stuff and left in a huge hurry.  After I left, I see the poor old ferarri off the side of the road in a ditch, and the guy was arrested for driving a stolen car and illegally possesing firearms (as noted in the blotter).  Really...funny.  I dont know why I said that here, but hell, it was related to the range somewhat

I was at an indoor range that rents out a pump Rossi 22LR.  A customer had just finish shooting the rifle, the range employee took the rifle from the customer, opens the action to check for a loaded round, no round; so the employee closes the action, pulls the trigger, and BANG!  A round was hung-up in the chamber.  Fortunately, the bullet was stopped by a wall, and no one was hurt, but it sure scarced a lot of people.

Here's a couple that I did not witness myself, but heard from my most trusted buddy in the Army:

One early morning at Ft. Lewis, some visiting British troops got a little confused about which way to shoot their rifles. At a different range, farther along the edge of the impact area, some of our infantry were just getting set up when a bullet comes bounding over the horizon and hits a guy about waist-high. Within seconds the guy's clothing was soaked with... Coca-Cola! It seems he was carrying a can of soda in his ammo pouch, which is where the bullet stopped. My buddy arrived at the range just minutes after this supposedly happened, so I'm not 100% sure this is true.

One I know really happened was when a lieutenant wanted to "experience" shooting an old-style Mk. 19 Mod. 1 fully automatic grenade launcher. The gunner showed him how to fire it, but neglected to point out that lifting the spade grips UP will move the impact point DOWN. Of course, the HE rounds are fused not to go off at less than 30 meters, but apparently the shrapnel is sometimes effective at ranges beyond 30 meters. By the time the fool's fingers loosened up an NCO at the range, who was fortunately wearing a flak vest, was hit in the chest. The good part was that the only injury was to the panic-stricken guy behind the trigger. He got hit in the foot, and when they got his boot off his sock was already soaked with blood. My buddy witnessed this first-hand and was not wearing a flak vest. After that vests became mandatory, only gunners could fire, and the gun mounts were modified to prevent depressing fire below horizontal.

Then there's the time I shot my 49/56 through the kitchen floor and blew out our basement window, but in an effort to protect my reputation here I'm not going to discuss that.

There is a gun shop and range in a nearby suburb.  They have a whole bunch of handguns for rent.  He rented one, bought some bullets and went to the bathroom.  It ended there.

All this talk is exactly why I prefer to shoot in the desert. It's safer out there!

Ya know, I didn't think about this earlier, but in Huntington Beach, CA, they no longer have a police shooting range.  The reason for this is that sometime around 10 years ago or so, a kid in a school playground was hit by a bullet.  When the research was all over, it was determined that it was a bullet from an officers gun, from the range about a mile away.  Some guy had shot over the berm.

DOH!  

About 15 or so years ago, the Sheriff's Office I used to work for employed a Deputy to reload our practice ammo.  This worked out fine until this Deputy went through a rather unpleasant divorce.  Myself and 5 other Deputies (not the loader)were on the 7 yard line, shooting the final string of our qualification.  I heard a louder than normal boom to my right, and a lot of smoke.  I looked over, and my buddy is holding his Python with the topstrap and half the cylinder just GONE.  Nobody was hit with anything, just shook up.  Funny thing was, the guy still qualified.  After that, the SO took up business with a commercial reloader.