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Wear your eye protection
- Thread starter Burning Love
- Start date
Did you hit the shooter in the mouth that launched the bullet?
No, he didn’t do anything wrong.
My buddy's brother took a load of birdshot to the thigh's while we were hunting Woodcock along a streamed. Two of us on each side, he got up on a stump for a better look at where the dog was as it popped up, his brother swung the shotgun after the bird and boom! Due to the gators he was wearing in the snow, only got a few pellets penetrate, but did tumble him off the stump.
No fooling! I just got hearing aids about 3 weeks ago. Lots of loud music in my younger years, noisy work environments, lots of shooting with no ear protection took its toll. I knew my hearing had gotten worse as I’ve aged but I really didn’t realize just how bad it was.
I used to shoot at a club that had a steel backstop 50ft out. Well maintained, oiled regularly, inclined to divert lead up into a helical collector etc. Considered state of the art maybe 40 years ago, and overall viewed as a bunch of experienced shooters as being an A+ facility.
Of course, by its very design - you're still shooting steel.
I learned very early that eyepro AND long sleeves were a good idea, after being hit twice on the same day with very sharp pieces of jacketing. Everyone on the line was shooting paper, and I got a chunk of a lead back on my forearm that broke the skin, and then about an hour later with another piece about half an inch under my eye that had to be cut out.
Not the a long sleeved shirt would have saved the cut on my arm or my face, but yeah - eyes (and ears) people.
Of course, by its very design - you're still shooting steel.
I learned very early that eyepro AND long sleeves were a good idea, after being hit twice on the same day with very sharp pieces of jacketing. Everyone on the line was shooting paper, and I got a chunk of a lead back on my forearm that broke the skin, and then about an hour later with another piece about half an inch under my eye that had to be cut out.
Not the a long sleeved shirt would have saved the cut on my arm or my face, but yeah - eyes (and ears) people.
At least as a young adult I was wearing ear muffs when shooting firearms. My ears where ringing still after shooting. My ears have had tinnitus for a good while now. My actual hearing is pretty normal, but I've been tone deaf all my life. I did have my ears checked to see what was really going on a few years back
Stuff can always happen.
I caught a .380 ricochet from another shooter, at an indoor range, smack in the center of the lens of my shooting glasses over my dominant eye. No injury to me.
Caught my own ricochet, or perhaps it was a piece of gravel, in my right cheekbone, just under the lens.
Saw a shooter on a line I was running catch a ricochet in his left nut…..by his own statement. His pants stopped it, but it was enough to cause him to double over.
I was shooting 5.56 on cardboard targets. A rock about the size of a golf ball was launched from inside the dirt of the berm, up in the air, and came down on the crown of my head. Lacerated my scalp and bleed pretty good.
I had to use a pair of needle nose pliers to pull a large piece of jacket out of my left index finger.
I could write a book just listing stuff like this that I’ve seen on ranges over the decades. Point is, in every instance I listed above, no safety rules were violated. The safe stand-off distance for steel targets wasn’t violated.
Shooting firearms is inherently dangerous. Accept that, and know where the line is that separates dangerous from unsafe.
I caught a .380 ricochet from another shooter, at an indoor range, smack in the center of the lens of my shooting glasses over my dominant eye. No injury to me.
Caught my own ricochet, or perhaps it was a piece of gravel, in my right cheekbone, just under the lens.
Saw a shooter on a line I was running catch a ricochet in his left nut…..by his own statement. His pants stopped it, but it was enough to cause him to double over.
I was shooting 5.56 on cardboard targets. A rock about the size of a golf ball was launched from inside the dirt of the berm, up in the air, and came down on the crown of my head. Lacerated my scalp and bleed pretty good.
I had to use a pair of needle nose pliers to pull a large piece of jacket out of my left index finger.
I could write a book just listing stuff like this that I’ve seen on ranges over the decades. Point is, in every instance I listed above, no safety rules were violated. The safe stand-off distance for steel targets wasn’t violated.
Shooting firearms is inherently dangerous. Accept that, and know where the line is that separates dangerous from unsafe.
Rock on top of the head. Things are starting to make a lot more sense now....
