Billy Jim Bobs At The Range

[Moondoggie]

Wife and I went out spend a little range time this afternoon.

There's a small "Ad hoc" range about 10 miles from town on some farmland. I have permission from the owner to shoot there, but pretty much everybody uses it as if it's their own. The owner doesn't like everybody and their brother using it, but the location doesn't lend itself to fencing it off.

Anyway, I loaded-up my M1A, Tommy Gun, IPSC pistol, mouse gun, wife's 2 favorite wheel guns & headed out. Since I had quite a $ of firearms in the truck, I stuck my mousegun in my pocket. I always keep it handy when I'm out in the middle of nowhere shooting.

When we arrived there was 1 car already there. Looked to be a father and son...Dad in his 40's, son in early 20's. The son is wearing a baseball cap backwards so we could easily read his statement of individuality...it read "F**K OFF".

There's really only 1 shooting position, so we had to wait for them to finish shooting which the Dad said would only be a few minutes.

Wife and I sat in our vehicle watching them shoot for about 10 minutes. Dad was sighting-in a couple of single shot rifles, sonny cranked-of 10 whole rds from his SKS rapid fire and acted like he'd scored a touchdown at the superbowl. Then sonny laid the SKS on the table and drew a Mod 10 from his waistband and STARTED SPINNING IT ON HIS FINGER RIGHT NEXT TO WHERE HIS DAD WAS SEATED AT THE BENCH!

Wife and I looked at each other........

Fortunately, the pistol was unloaded, as we watched him open the cylinder and load 6 which he proceded to launch towards the backstop. Then a few more minutes of spinning it on his finger. Believe me, he had my undivided attention.

Shortly, they put all 4 guns in the trunk of their car and Dad waved t me that they were done so I backed up beside the bench and opened the tailgate on my pickup. I have a hard tonneau cover and a rollout "drawer" in the back.

Besides the mousegun in my pocket, I had wifes Taurus 85S (loaded) laying on a gunrug among my other gear/guns in the truckbed.

Instead of leaving, they walked over and struck up a conversation "Watcha gonna shoot?"

"Couple of pistols and an M-14" I reply.

About this time, Sonny reaches for the Taurus on my tailgate! My hand covers the gun before his does and I say "Excuse me! Reaching for a stranger's gun is one of the worst ideas you've ever had!"

He says "I was just gonna look at it."

I replied "Looking doesn't require handling."

Dad apologized and they left pretty quickly. I'm sure Sonny was saying what a butthead I was.

Where do people like this come from?

 

[TexasRifleman]

I'm sure Sonny was saying what a butthead I was.

At least you let him live to say it, that shows great patience and understanding on your part.

Where do people like this come from?

His mom and sister are probably the same person.

 

[TBeck]

When I shoot at any isolated range, I always make sure to have a loaded weapon on my person.

What the yutz would have done will never be known for sure, but it doesn't pay to take chances. I'd say you handled it well.

 

[U.S.SFC_RET]

You absolutely dd the right thing. ole sonny boy would of likely wanted to twirl that thing. I have zero respect for anyone who doesn't respect firearms period. To me if dad would have asked me whatcha gonna shoot? I would have probably said something very curt and not so very high road.

 

[357wheelgunner]

A friend and I were shooting at a 3 bench public range in northern wisconsin. We asked the 20 something year old duo on the bench next to us if it was alright to go downrange and setup targets. They said it would be alright so we went down. I finished setting up two targets at the 50 yard backstop and turned around to see each of them put a fresh magazine into their AK knockoffs and wrack the action. It scared the hell out of me. We left our targets, packed our stuff up and left. I had a model 13 under my shirt and felt very very threatened. Stupid stupid people do everything that they can to make bad things happen, then wonder why their lives are so hard.

I rarely shoot at public ranges anymore....

 

[auberg]

I guess I'm lucky. The range I go to has some very good ROs. I was there just yesterday, and the RO was very careful, repeating each time a break was taken, that no firearms should be touched during the break.

 

[sacp81170a]

Cardinal rules of range etiquette:

1. Thou shalt not touch another's equipment without asking permission first.
2. Thou shalt keep thy ****beaters off thine equipment when others are downrange. (This one burns me in particular. :banghead: )
3. Thou shalt not approach the firing line or cross behind others on the firing line without thy action open.
4. Thou shalt not paint others with thy muzzle.

These are rules I simply will not compromise on. If I have any control over the range, the one who violates any of these rules will be asked summarily to leave or I will leave in the interest of my own safety. What other rules of range etiquette should we add?

 

[cheygriz]

You handled it well.

It's VERY easy to escalate a situation, but much more difficult to de-escalate after adrenaline starts flowing. Congratulations on handling something that could have become confrontational with good old common sense.

 

[Derby FALs]

To each their own. Sounds like father and son had a nice bonding time. Looks like they are somewhat ignorant of the rules of gun safety and you missed an opportunity to pass down some knowledge. Unless, you were naturally born with those instincts.

 

[Cliff47]

What really scares the bejabbers out of me is that these people are BREEDING! Just makes chills do about three laps of the spine thinking about it.

Sonny could have at least asked, 'May I?'.

 

[TBeck]

you missed an opportunity to pass down some knowledge

That seems like a real Condition White attitude to take. The whole situation would have made my skin crawl, too. He observed some grossly negligent gun-handling and you are asking him to expose himself and his wife to even more of it? All alone on a range that is far away from medical facilities?

Odds are those yahoos "knew all about guns" and any attempt to "edumacate" them could have made a bad situation worse. He got them on their way, which was the responsible thing to do.

I worry about the poster's friend who owns the property. By failing to even try to secure it or control access he is potentially opening himself up to an "attractive nuisance" lawsuit when somebody gets hurt.

 

[Derby FALs]

I'm never in condition WHITE at the range. It never hurts to be amicable and try to educate about gun safety. I would have told him watch out, that's loaded. I then would have showed him that it wasn't but told him why I said it was. Mine wouldn't have been loaded until I got to line. That's a job for my CCW. But, First Rule around my guns is they are always loaded. From there I could weasel in my other three rules about my guns. Then maybe I would let him handle it and possibly shoot it. That's just me though.

 

[whatbrick]

1. Thou shalt not touch another's equipment without asking permission first.
2. Thou shalt keep thy ****beaters off thine equipment when others are downrange. (This one burns me in particular. )
3. Thou shalt not approach the firing line or cross behind others on the firing line without thy action open.
4. Thou shalt not paint others with thy muzzle.

Oddly enough these are the same "Cardinal Rules" used in the men's restroom.

There have only been a couple of times that I can recall less than stellar firearm safety practices at a shooting range. The most recent was from a little girl with a break-open single-shot .22 rifle that made my "oh-crap-someone-has-their-muzzle-pointed-right-at-me" sense go off. Sure enough I looked over and stared straight down the barrel.

"Excuse me, honey, it isn't safe to point a rifle at someone like that." I said using my favorite-Uncle voice.

Of course she used the sweet little-girl voice when she said the famous last words "It's not loaded."

Luckily her father(grandfather maybe) noticed this and corrected her. I was too busy initiating the Matrix bullet-dodge motion (aka, the muzzle-dance) to see if her finger was on the trigger or not. The Mall-Ninja Training and Tactics class seminar had failed me on that one.

The other was at an indoor range where class 3 weapons could be rented and one guy thought it'd be fun to let his 6-7 year-old son have a crack at the M-16 he had rented. I was in the next lane to the right of them as mini-Rambo spattered just about everything in the range accept the target in front of him. I decided it was time to leave as soon as the metal-clamps used to secure my target were blasted off. It was the shortest range trip I've ever had.

So far no one has tried to touch any of my firearms without permission, and I hope it stays that way.

 

[SoCalShooter]

Well handled very good quote too. At my club's range we have excellent RO's who are on the ball when cease fire is called. Does not mean we have not had to occasionally remind someone not to touch the hardware but that was quickly dispatched.

 

[helpless]

Once when I was at Hernando Sportsmans Club here in Florida, When the line was hot and everyone was blasting away, some guy starts walking out to his target with stapler and replacement target in hand.

The ROs are great there but they can not always stop stupid in it's tracks. Lucky for this oldguy none of us are as stupid as he was so everyones stops shooting and starts screaming at him.

Needless to say, He was asked to leave.

Yes this really happened.

 

[sacp81170a]

Oddly enough these are the same "Cardinal Rules" used in the men's restroom.

 

[CAPTAIN MIKE]

Range Etiquette

In my humble opinion, it's the responsibility of the 'prime mover' of a guest at any range to make sure that his or her guest understands some basic range etiquette, and in this case, the father should have joined in with you instead of standing by passively saying nothing.

At least he had the good sense to apologize when his son reached for your firearm on your tailgate without first asking for your permission. You handled it well and with maturity and good judgment. You didn't berate the boy, just put him in his place with quick and sure action and without berating or belittling him.

 

[buck00]

sonny cranked-of 10 whole rds from his SKS rapid fire and acted like he'd scored a touchdown at the superbowl.

hahahahahhahahhha


I've seen that before. You get some yahoo blazing away wildly with a semi-auto, maybe getting 2 shots out of 30 on the target, then they celebrate and pump their chest as if everyone at the range is impressed.

 

[Derby FALs]

A friend of mine used to compete in Hi Power Rifle comp. Damn fine shot and he used to win a bit. He still likes to do that when he gets to the range to burn off excess adrenaline. Beats his chest too.

 

[cbsbyte]

A few years ago I had a smiliar experience at a private rifle range where their are no range officers. Too many non members use it especially during hunting season. A father with two teenage sons showed up with several rifles to sight in before deer season. They took a bench furthest from me. One of the son who was mid teens picked up one of his Dads rifles and proceeded to point the gun in my direction while showing the other son how to turn of the saftey. I yelled at him to point the gun down range the father turned around and grapped the gun out of the kid hands and put it down on the bench. He made a hand motion that he was going to strike the kid if he did that again. I thanked the father and proceeded to shoot. the kid glared at me like I wronged him, the rest of the time. After this incident, and seeing too many beer cans laging around, I rarlely go to that range.

 

[Lupinus]

I know the feeling as short of a few hundred bucks to get started the only range I get to use is a public range. People like this are the exact reason I tend to go to the range on the days people think you must be crazy for, not raining or anything but cold overcast just rained etc. Last time I was there one of the park service guys stopped in surprised as hell to see someone shooting and we talked for near a half hour on recent idiots, including the ones who left shredded plywood all over the damn range . Naturally there are the same idiots that got kicked off the range for scarring their buddy by shooting into the air while he was down range.

And people wonder why freakin accidents happen, bet you a box of ammo when numb nuts shoots himself in the belly he is going to blame it on the gun.

 

[Bazooka Joe71]

Oddly enough these are the same "Cardinal Rules" used in the men's restroom.

You might want to reread the third rule, and rethink what you said.

I don't want ANYONE'S action open while behind me in the restroom.

 

[Matt King]

You will run into idiots in every sport. I am glad that no one got hurt due to the man's carelessness. I am very lucky that the Range Officer's at my range are top notch, and are always very alert when it comes to safety.

 

[Lupinus]

Once when I was at Hernando Sportsmans Club here in Florida, When the line was hot and everyone was blasting away, some guy starts walking out to his target with stapler and replacement target in hand.

The ROs are great there but they can not always stop stupid in it's tracks. Lucky for this oldguy none of us are as stupid as he was so everyones stops shooting and starts screaming at him.

Yeah I used to shoot there and the RO's are great. Been awhile and I forget his name but the one guy is hilarious, the one with the bum leg and a limp, can't remember his name though.

 

[cmidkiff]

I concur with the general opinions expressed... but have a question.

Is it permissible to be loading a detached magazine while people are futzing with their targets? I would never lay a hand on a firearm while someone was downrange, but I do sometimes load my empty mags. I had one person say something to me about it... in a rather abrupt manner. Fine, if it bothers him, then I won't do so, and I didn't for the duration of that outing... but still, I see nothing improper with this activity, and I was slightly peeved for the rudeness of his statement. Am I in the wrong here?