Stray Bullets From Shooting Range Fly Into Home

[ColinthePilot]

Sorry, I used the News Report's headline as the thread title. I figured it would get attention.

http://www.nbc10.com/news/15454211/detail.html

BUCKS COUNTY, Pa. -- A Bucks County family got quite a scare when bullets from a shooting range came flying through their home.

"It sounded like a big pop or bang," Rich Harbert said.

Images | Video Report


That pop shattered the quiet Saturday afternoon Harbert was enjoying with his family in their Buckingham Township home.

"I came upstairs, I looked up, and there's a hole in the ceiling, and looked in my bedroom, and there's a bullet lying in the middle of the bedroom," Harbert said.

"You definitely wouldn't want that hitting you," Sgt. J.R. Landis, of Buckingham Township Police Department, said.

Authorities said two bullets hit the Harbert's home. Police said the stray bullets came from Wicen's Shooting Range, just down the road.

"The shooter was a first-time shooter. He was not familiar with the weapon. The weapon was set up to shoot at an extreme distance," Landis said.

Police said the shooter mistakenly set up his military rifle to shoot 500 yards rather than 50 yards and the bullet sailed 3/4 of a mile to the Harbert's home.

"I was probably up into the wee hours of the morning, just thinking of those kinds of things, just imagining. You can't even comprehend it," Harbert said.

Harbert said he had just taken his 2-and-a-half-year-old daughter from her bedroom, and carried her downstairs. Ten minutes later, the bullet came flying through the roof.

View Images

"We were standing right here at this hole, opening up the gate to go downstairs," Harbert said.

"It's an isolated incident. It's the first time in my 23-year career here in Buckingham I'm aware of a bullet from the Wicen's range striking a house," Landis said.

The owners of Wicen's shooting range didn't return phone calls. Police said the owners have installed equipment to prevent shooters from aiming too high.

"We understand they've been here since 1928. I'm not looking to shut it down," Harbert said.

What Harbert does want is for Wicen's to ban rifles, or point their weapons in a different direction. He said he would appeal to state or county officials if necessary to give his family peace of mind.

"It's really not just about us, it's about the community, too," Harbert said.

Oh yeah, welcome back, everyone!

 

[Larry E]

Sounds like this range needs a higher backstop or overhead baffles to stop out of safety rounds which is what the range I was a member of in Seattle did. They still had "neighbors" who claimed to have found bullets on their property. The fact that there was no physical way bullets from that range could have struck their property sort of put a damper on any and all claims against the range.

There are plenty of non gun owners and anti gunners out there looking to shut down ranges who are more than willing to, uh, fake things, hard as that might be to believe.

 

[SASS#23149]

Police said the owners have installed equipment to prevent shooters from aiming too high

They're gonna need a lot better equipment than that to stay in business.

Glad no one was hurt,and hope they get it figure out,we don't need less ranges.

glad to be back !

 

[Antipasta]

A thread started by the gentleman who found himself at the center of this incident can be found here...

http://www.pafoa.org/forum/general-2/17681-my-interesting-day-wicen-s.html

 

[ColinthePilot]

The range I frequent constantly harps on "ricochets" blamed on rapid fire, and to a lesser extent, poor target placement(I was asked to stop shooting at the lower target on a 10 yd range to avoid bouncing rounds off the dirt and over the backstop). Apparently they had a similar incident a few years back. I don't mind the rules but blaming rapid fire at 25yds seems a little extreme.

As for trying to ban rifles at this range, do these people not understand that rifles are far more accurate than pistols at longer ranges? (silly question). I would be more worried about handguns beyond 25yds than rifles at 200.

I also noticed on Antipasta's link, that folks are comparing ranges on Google Earth. I just looked at it. The closest house on a realistic trajectory with the range is only 1400yds away, less than 1 statute mile. the mosin nagant is said to have a max range of between 2000 and 3000 yds. Not effective range, but well within the MAX range.

 

[jaholder1971]

Bottom line: I'm more than 90 percent certain the guy accidentally let one over the berm. It happens.

I'm more than a little irritated with some of the posters over on the other board trying to explain away the chances it could have happened simply because there's been an effort to shut the range down.

I'm also irritated that people would buy a patch of dirt and not explore around the neighborhood to see what going on around them before they plunk down 6-7 figures on their home for (nearly) life. I'm even more irritated at those who don't, then complain because they built their trophy home next to a shooting range/landfill/airport/nudist-swinger's camp and want it shut down.

Ok, I admit. I'm irritable today.

 

[5string_dean]

I did an Appleseed shoot at that range last year. The range officers that were there the weekend I was there were EXTREMELY careful about target placement and making sure there was NO "rapid fire" shooting (this is actually mandated by a court settlement... there must be 4 seconds between shots).

They have a serious, high berm and panels of what looks like heavy duty conveyor belt rubber panels mounted from poles close to the shooting positions to keep people from shooting high.

Suburbia has definitely surrounded that range. It's made worse by the fact that the topography of the area is almost completely flat.

 

[Darthbauer]

Its like the house by the driving range, if you dont want your house to be getting pelted by golf balls then dont live there. Same rules apply with a shooting range, I wouldnt want to live anywhere near being down range.



And if you think that is a bad comparison and that golf balls dont kill tell that to the decapitated duck I saw when I was golfing the other day.

 

[ColinthePilot]

Its like the house by the driving range, if you dont want your house to be getting pelted by golf balls then dont live there. Same rules apply with a shooting range, I wouldnt want to live anywhere near being down range.

And if you think that is a bad comparison and that golf balls dont kill tell that to the decapitated duck I saw when I was golfing the other day.

I'm no lawyer, but as I've been led to understand, thats not true. It IS common sense, but not technically true in a legal sense. I took an aviation law class in college. My college's flight department was constantly getting complaints from folks living near the local airports. Apparently, even though they built their houses next to an 60-70 yr old airport, they have a right to enjoy their property, and we had to revise our traffic patterns. Idiotic, I know, but according to my professor, its legal.

 

[mekender]

depends on the state, some states have gun range protection laws... but those typically are prohibiting people from making noise complaints... a round leaving the range would be a whole different can of worms...

 

[brentn]

This is really unfortunate when a safe shooting sport is labeled as 'unsafe' Truth be told however, that it is perfectly safe provided the user is educated in the craft of marksmanship

point being, had he known how to use his rifle this would not have happened. If theres any remedy to be done here, its not to build a better backstop or to ban long range shooting at this range. Its to have range officers test thier customers before they use the long range bay and make sure that they know what they are doing before they start to load their rifle.

 

[tmajors]

That bullet at the pictures looks pretty pristine for going through a house. Discolored yes but I would think at least the nose would be at least a little mushed.

 

[unspellable]

statistics?

Assume the worst here as far as the range is concerned. Then compare to a list of other activities. How much of this sort of hoopla do you hear about foot ball injuries? Archery accidents? Horse related fatalities? Like the owner of the parachuting operation I used to work for said, "There are a dozen auto fatalities on page 15 every week but the single parachuting accident in a year goes on page 1."

 

[mekender]

Police said the shooter mistakenly set up his military rifle to shoot 500 yards rather than 50 yards and the bullet sailed 3/4 of a mile to the Harbert's home.

i wish i had a rifle that i could "set" to shoot a specific distance...

 

[romma]

They are trying to shut down a club up here just because they assumed shots came from it.

A dentist off ice was hit, and the cops went straight to the club and confiscated a rifle from a shooter and were convinced it was his rifle.

The shooter and club were ostracized by the media and town even after ballistics came back negative...

They are still trying to shut the club down anyway because it's noisy.

 

[silverlance]

A shooting range, regardless of its preeminence or location, MUST NOT ALLOW BULLETS TO LEAVE ITS SAFETY ZONES. A impact zone is the area where bullets are expected to have an impact upon. When a bullet leaves a range's impact zone, then that range has become complicit in unsafe shooting. That is the bottom line, plain and simple.

There are two simple ways to do this. Firstly, a range must have a backstop high enough to catch any unintentionally overshot rounds. For a 100 yard range, I would make the backstop at least 35 feet high. I am a member of three ranges. At one (BCR), the backstop is the side of a mountain. At the other two, the backstop is a .5 mile by 1 mile swath of land at a gradual incline. the land after each of these last two impact zones is wilderness for several more miles.

Secondly, ROs need to watch for idiots. There are always idiots, who want tos ee where their bullet will go and will try to sneak a shot into the distance. If a shooter aims anywhere other than straight at the berm, kick his ass out.

 

[Archie]

I see a couple of contributing problems here, and both historic.

One. The range has been there "...since 1928." Why didn't the range buy enough land back then to own and control the impact area? Doesn't seem like a real complicated concept to me.

Two. How did the developers build and sell homes on land downrange from a rifle range? Again, that does not seem like a real complicated concept to me.

Notwithstanding ColinthePilot's professor, the conditions extant at the time of construction and sale - especially of a dwelling - should fall back on the developer and builder. Except when the city/county/zoning/planning council is owned and operated by the housing industry complex. Gee; who would have even guessed?

 

[Antipasta]

A shooting range, regardless of its preeminence or location, MUST NOT ALLOW BULLETS TO LEAVE ITS SAFETY ZONES.

I have to agree with silverlance. The range I belong to has a series of overhead baffles on each range that prevents errant shots from sailing off into the distance. They get progressively lower and make it impossible to launch a bullet over the berm. Is it an expensive solution? Probably, but then so is a wrongful death lawsuit.