Range horror. I hope you're sitting down for this, I've never seen anything like it.

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Ranger Roberts

Ranger Roberts

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It's not often that I go to a range and this weekend reminded me why. Typically I shoot at my house (I am fortunate enough to have the property to do so), but my wife/in-laws and I belong to a private range as well. We typically go up there to throw clay and occasionally we bring clients (my wife and her dad own their own business). This weekend my wife asked me to go up to the range with her, my father in-law, a client and his son. I'm always happy to oblige to such a request, especially when we can write off the ammo!
Let me describe the set-up of the range for you before I get too far ahead of myself. Imagine cutting a baseball diamond (infield) in half, the side furthest to the left has 3 benches where you can shoot 100, 75 and 50 yards. The side furthest to the right has 2 benches to shoot 25 yards, if nobody else is at the range you can walk up closer to shoot pistol. If there are other people there, there is a pistol range a short walk away.
My wife and I got up there a bit early and after a few minutes of waiting we were met by her client and his son. We grabbed a bunch of rifles and headed up to the benches. We set up on one that wasn't occupied and hung out while waiting for her father. There were to younger guys (early 20's) shooting an AR and a few pistols. They told us that they were all done shooting pistols and were just going to use the rifle range. Both were real nice guys and were handling their firearms safely.
This is where it gets bad. As we are waiting a guy (I'd say around 40) and a young girl (I'd say between 8 & 10) walk up to the benches. While the other guys are shooting their rifle (hot range, with active fire!), the guy walks onto the range and heads over to hang up a target at the 25 yard mark. The guy with the AR immediately stops firing, points the rifle in a safe direction, unloads and unchambers. We were all in shock. It literally happened so fast we didn't even have time to yell. The guy holding the AR looked at us in complete disbelief. He sets the gun on the bench and says "uhh, what should I do?". I don't think he wanted to start any trouble or be rude so he just stood there. I yelled out to the guy and his daughter "Hey man, this was a hot range, what the heck are you doing?". At this point he's done hanging up his target, walks a few yards away and unholsters a revolver. I yelled over again and he ignores me again. After he fires his 6 shots, he turns to all of us and says "You guys don't have to stop shooting. Just keep it aimed to the left." :what:??? Not only is he down range, but he's asking us to shoot over his and his daughters heads!!!
Well, the 2 guys with the AR immediately packed up and started to leave. I excused myself from the client and his son and walked up to the club house to see if any board members were there. There was one guy there and I explained what happened. He walks out with me to confront the guy. Here's the kicker... the guy is a board member!!!!!! He gets all insulted about being confronted and started to get a little belligerent. He eventually huffs and puffs and marches himself and his daughter to the car and leaves.
I am a police officer. I am a NRA certified rifle and pistol instructor. I was in the army for 10 years and did 3 tours overseas. I have never, in my life seen anything like this before!!!
Sorry for the long post guys. I had to vent!
 
The guy is a Board member? Well, that's going to be an uncomfortable next board meeting! :eek:

Walking your daughter down range while rifles are firing seems pretty close to endangerment, to me. I'd want this guy OUT of my club, pronto! Of course, at our club he would be.

Do you know if there will be follow-up proceedings?
 
Unfortunately, people walking onto a hot range isn't uncommon around here... I've seen it several times.

I've never been sure if it was because they were such jerks they'd get a thrill out of stopping everyone from shooting, or if they were simply oblivious to warning signs, range rules, and common sense.
 
Keep us posted. This is an interesting/unsafe situation. If I was in your shoes and the board members didn't take appropriate action I'd leave the range for good.
 
Not only is that incredibly unsafe, but he is teaching his daughter terrible firearm/range safety. I really hope that this was a one time lapse in judgement, but something tells me that it's not.
 
It won't happen to me or ?

...

Blind Faith

Simply put, a trust that everyone around will shoot straight and not hit him as if returning to some war zone and everyone around him has his back..

Or maybe an underlying death wish, hard to tell about either, in this type of situation/surrounding..

You, and the young men, did exactly right as his blind faith pushed the outside of the envelope of life IMHO

And, with a young child, I have no answers for that


Ls
 
Wow, you'd think people would have more common sense than that.

Just a few weekends ago, I was out at the national grasslands here in colorado. It was starting to get a little bit busy (I saw maybe 3 other groups, but they were all shooting clays, and were probably 200+ yards away and shooting away from my direction), and two more cars pull up, not but 30 feet on either side of me. First thing they did was walk out to set up targets, very close to my line of fire. At the moment they started walking I had a full cylinder of .44 that I promptly cleared and set on my table. I felt sort of bad having to leave my targets out there when it came time for me to leave (as I very much oppose littering- although they were just paper targets and a few clays), but there was absolutely no safe way I would retrieve them.
 
Given you occupation and the fact that you personaly witnessed what Sam, and I, feel was a clear case of child endangerment, I'd be giving some serious thot to a professional follow up.
I would in the very least talk it over with my Sgt. and get his advice.
 
I see you are new to guns. Welcome to the gun culture.

Clint Smith puts it this way, lots of people have been cut with knives (usually in the kitchen over a bagel) but few people have been shot and thus do not appreciate the danger of firearms because of their lack of training/experience.
 
Given you occupation and the fact that you personaly witnessed what Sam, and I, feel was a clear case of child endangerment, I'd be giving some serious thot to a professional follow up.
Click to expand...

In CT this would be a pretty clear Risk of Injury to a Minor, case.
And in my private club, he'd be asked to leave and not return, BOD member or not.
 
Sam 1911
Do you know if there will be follow-up proceedings?
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I'm not sure if there will be. I am definitely following up with them though. My department actually uses this range to qualify once a year. We rent out the range for 2 days and it's closed to all other members. Not that it should mean that we pull more weight or anything, but I'm sure they won't want to lose the revenue if we decide to go elsewhere.
 
Given you occupation and the fact that you personaly witnessed what Sam, and I, feel was a clear case of child endangerment, I'd be giving some serious thot to a professional follow up.
I would in the very least talk it over with my Sgt. and get his advice.
Click to expand...

I just talked with my chief about it and he is making a few phone calls to child protective services. It unfathomable what this guy did.

I feel bad saying it, but when we first pulled up and we saw the young guys with the AR and the pistols, the first thing that popped into my head was "these guys probably aren't going to be very safe". I know that I shouldn't assume but because of past experiences I did.

Nothing could have prepared me for what that guy did with his daughter!
 
It happens. I remember one time at a hot pistol range with about 20 people blasting away, a fellow just strides right out with targets and a stand. I've seen it happen at other times where nobody was actually shooting, but the range was hot. A surprising number of people don't really understand range discipline.
 
Ranger,

I've seen an idiot do just what you said. Walked out there while a bunch of us were firing. I yelled 'cease fire' and the guy stopped and looked at me wondering why I got everyone to stop firing.

There are idiots out there. Usually Uncle Darwin weeds them out early but some do luck out in life.

Deaf
 
Goes to show that even a private range can't keep out the dummies. Way to set an example for stupidity. Good thing he didn't walk out there with his child.
 
A month or two ago i was at the pistol range of a local gun range. Well into a "cold range" some jack ass yelled "hot range" as i was still hanging my target. I turned and yelled a "no, it's not a hot 'bleeping' range" and he laughed and said he was just kidding. I obviously was not amused.
 
Range horror. I hope you're sitting down for this, I've never seen anything like it.
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You must not go shooting very often. I've personally seen something similar happen at least half a dozen times in the last 20 years. Since I only average maybe 3 or 4 hours a week at a range, I would imagine that it also happens quite a bit when I'm not there.

I'm with Cosmoline, a lot of people just don't understand range discipline. The ones I've talked to about it seem to figure that as long as you're all shooting in a straight line at your target then there shouldn't be any problems.

Always remember that half the people out there are below average in intelligence.
 
I had a similar experience. I'd just shot a few rounds out of my 35 remington when a hawk flew down onto my target.

The nerve! He just stared at me for about 5 minutes. I finally had to walk down range to tell the guy to get the heck off my target. After some coarse words, he went away.
 
Though it is a bit hard to wrap my mind around how anyone could do something like that, I could somewhat expect it from a new shooter. But someone who is on the board of a gun club?! It makes me wonder how a guy like that could wind up on a board. Must be one of those good ol boy situations.

I started out as a completely self-taught shooter who wasn't brought up shooting. I remember when I was a teen/early 20s kid and first getting into it, I realized that when I was going onto a gun range, there were certain expected norms of behavior that people go by. I really watched and paid attention to the procedures -- aside from all safety concerns, I also wanted to look like I knew what I was doing, and just not look like a dumbass. It's hard to imagine someone not even caring about those types of concerns.

All that said, I think it is completely uncalled for to inform child protective services on the guy. I wouldn't do that to my worst enemy. Besides, by the way the OP described it, he didn't endanger the kid... just himself.
 
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