Shooting causing brush fires?

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Robereno

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This is one of those “new shooter” questions.

When doing target practice or hunting in brushfire prone country, how likely is it that you could start a fire? Our entire place burned a few years ago when a hunter got lost and shot off a flare gun. But, it was a flare gun.

Kind of a silly question but when using a firearm what would actually start a fire? The bullet hitting a rock & causing a spark? Hot ejected shell landing in the brush? Flame from muzzle getting too close to dry leaves?

I’m pretty new a shooting but the likelihood of starting a fire seems kind of remote. Has anyone ever seen it happen?

These days I pretty much take a fire extinguisher everywhere I go.
 
Yes the danger is real.
Yes I have seen it happen: twice.
I actually saw it happen a third time, but that was caused by someone screwing around with one of those Dragon's Breath shotgun shells. The other two were caused by shooting standard rifle ammo at standard targets.
I have also seen a fire start on the floor of an indoor range. It was a pile of stuff they swept up and didn't dispose of: they left it in a pile down range on the floor. Regular jacketed 9mm handgun bullets strarted it on fire. People living in areas like the southeast US where it rains frequently and where it is humid have no idea of the fire danger in the southwestern US.
I certainly wouldn't expect something like this to happen in Georgia, but California is a whole different ballgame.
Here where I live, we average just a few inches of rainfall a year. The all time record for rain is just over 2" in one day.
 
It could happen, I guess.
But I think it would have to be from a muzzle blast from a CZ52 or something similar with the muzzle held almost on the ground in some sort of tinder.
 
I once shot a abandoned car out in the middle of nowhere.The impact of a bullet must have sparked something cause within 2 minutes the car was ablaze.Luckily it quickly died out without spreading.:eek:
 
I don't think so.
Every third Saturday of the month is the Braintree CMP shoot. We will usually get 20 - 24 people. The first set is twenty rounds fired from the prone position.

Let me rephrase that: 24 people with M-1's, M-14's and M-16's flat on their bellies' firing twenty rounds across the grass, weeds and leaves.

I have never seen anything that approaches smoke or smolder. As far as sparks, that is Hollywood. Bullets that are copper clad or straight lead will not spark against anything. Ever.

Ejected casings maybe pretty hot if you caught one in your hands but they are nowhere near hot enough to start a fire.
 
with normal rounds highly unlikly. But if you use something like a tracer or other round that actually burns or exploads on impact then there is a very high probabilty if you are in a dry area.
 
It happened here right above me a few yrs back in the
local San Bernardino mountains. Guy was shooting in
the forest and a large section or what's left of it from
the dry weather and bark beetles, caught on fire.

The guy didn't mean to start a fire, but the county went
after him & convicted him. He was forced to pay a pretty
large fine, but I don't recall if he had to serve time.

Now the Forestry shuts down the ranges that are in
the forest most of the yr due to the fire threats.
 
I think it's most common with muzzle loaders, as the wad usually leaves the barrel while it's still on fire. I've heard of it happening with shotguns as well. Fairly common. The range I frequent won't allow you to use bird shot into those sign board targets, the friction of all the pellets can get hot enough to ignite it.

Gives new meaning to "hot loads". :)
 
I just had someone remind me that the fire I mentioned earlier was caused when the hunter lit a signal fire, not by shooting a flare gun. Irrelevant to my question I guess.

I’ve just been hesitant to go out shooting recently what with the tinder dry conditions on our property. I guess like most things, if I’m cautious and don’t use exotic ammo I should be OK. Still going to keep that extinguisher handy though.

Bg, I wonder what sort of ammo that guy was using?
 
We had two fires on the range where they were shooting Bradley tables last week. Though I doubt too many people hunt or target practice with 25 mike-mike... :D
 
At SOI (Marines) tracers light up the brush/dry grass fairly often downrange.

Which is then fought by shutting down the line and sending everyone running down to stomp it out with boots and e-tools.

I've never seen it happen with ball ammo on an outdoor range but ball can cause sparks and a spark and tinder is all it takes, so I can believe it.

On the indoor range I worked at we'd get unburned powder all over the floor in front of the stations from poor reloads (and Magnums out of short barrels?).

I've seen a burning wad light that powder up and seen a sheet of 3' flames kinda slowly dance back and forth across the range floor.

It was pretty and the whole place is concrete so no big deal. I think the boss put all the BP shooters on one day after that. There weren't many of them in any event and the smoke got thick even with the vents running full out.
 
could be

dry enough it could happen i started a heck of a fire with a bush hog spark from blade hitting rock . very exciting for me
 
It happened behind my local range here in Utah. The range backs to a mountain and someone took some long range shots up the side of the hill. A couple hours later, fire trucks, etc. Be careful.
 
It's reality. Besides the flash from the muzzle, consider the time honored method of fire making: flint & steel. Heck, we use those components in flintlock rifles. If anything with iron hits a rock and causes a spark, and there is dry grass (ready tinder) nearby, it can ignite and then its burn, baby burn. Be a safe shooter. It's more than knowing what is beyond your target, but also knowing what's around it. We don't need any more fires this summer.
 
Remember that a lot of foreign surplus ammo has steel in either the bullet jacket or bullet core. Combine that with the assorted junk that people unfortunately leave out in the desert (some of it made of metal) and you have the possibility of sparks. I've also heard that if you hit the wrong kind of rock with a steel bullet you can also create sparks. Add in really dry brush like we have in the California desert and you have the potential for a brush fire.

A fire extinguisher is a great idea, also a shovel. BTW, you can check your ammo for steel by using a magnet and seeing if it sticks.
 
OK, well this thread started out with me feeling pretty confident that the likelihood of starting a fire was pretty remote. But the later posts have put me back on full alert about the prospect of starting something bad.

The spot I have set up for target practice is pretty well confined and I won’t be needlessly shooting off into the brush. I should probably do a little more brush clearing in the area though. And I’ll be watching closely for signs of smoke when I do practice.

Thanks everybody.
 
Part of the rationale behind banning tracer and incendiary ammo in CA is that it would light up random brushfires in the southern part of the state, if I remember correctly.
 
Quote: "a spark, and there is dry grass (ready tinder) nearby, it can ignite and then its burn, baby burn."

Yep, yep. Last fall, fire chief in little town just west of us told me that a bird hunter started a big one with muzzle flash from shotgun.
 
Interesting

At least a half dozen people post that they have not only heard of it, but have first hand experience.

Then other people post that there is no way this could happen just because they haven't seen it. :rolleyes:
 
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