Dumbest thing you've seen at the range?

[45bthompson]

This happened overseas in prep for a convoy. A soldier who is actually a smart and responsible man made a terrible mistake. The locking pin on his MOD 93 weapons mount got stuck as they often do. He was trying to knock the pin out and in his frustration it seemed like a good idea to use one of the delinked .50 BMG rounds as a hammer. (Every time you clear an M2 you end up the unused round laying around in your turret.) Well he struck the mount pin with the primer end and now he only has a thumb and a trigger finger. Last I heard they had transplanted some muscle tissue from his back to what was left of his hand so he would have more mobility. Complacency is a killer.

 

[atblis]

Two things come to mind.

There was a large group of college age guys and girls. No safety glasses. They brought a large flat screen CRT television to shoot. Put it out at 20 ft. One guy walked up to it, and started blasting away with birdshot. Got off about 4 rounds before anybody figured out what was going on. Litterally all the pellets were coming straight back off of the screen. I was getting pelted and I was standing about 15 ft behind everybody else. They were easily travelling fast enough to take an eye out. Everybody was wearing shorts and flipflops and such. I am sure they had some welts and maybe even broken skin.

The other (at the same range) incident: I was chronoing some rifle loads. The range was "cold", and people were down range setting up targets (range was full so maybe 20+ people down range). This guy comes over with his 5.7 pistol and asks me if he can shoot it over the chronograph. I say "sure, just make certain you don't shoot the screen". He stuffs a mag in, chambers a round, sits down and levels the gun over the chrono. I almost didn't catch him in time. There was litterally somebody directly behind the chrono. I think it was just a total brainfart on his part. He was very very embarassed.

EDIT: One more

I live college town which happens to have a National Forest range just outside town. Anyways, I am at the range, and these two guys show up; nice shiny new Jeep Cherokee, polo shirts, backwards hats, flip flops etc. etc. With them they bring a brand new H&K USP, and a toy Tonka truck. They setup the Tonka truck at about 15 ft away. They then proceed to dump clip after clip in the general direction of the truck. They never hit the freaking thing. At one point, they had kicked up so much dust, I had to quit shooting because I couldn't see my target.

 

[irishelcid]

We were at our monthly firearms training last week and it was my Lt's turn to shoot the course. He walks up to the starting point (simulating a traffic stop), instructor yells "gun!", Lt. draws and starts to move his Kimber forward before clearing the holster, catches his front sight on his holster, looses his grip and sends the gun into the dirt. Gun was fine, his pride, not so much.

 

[wulfhart]

I was at the range with my wife and a friend on the 5th of July (the day I got off work). We put all the rifles down me, informed our buddy that we were going to setup targets and my wife are walking out to the targets to set them up. I hear a crack behind us. I turn and see our friend holding his .22 rifle. I was shocked, my only response was to ask my wife, "Did he just shoot at us?" Then he started waving and and yelling, "Don't worry just a firecracker!" Apparently he thought it would be funny to hold his gun while lighting off a firecracker. I took him aside afterwards and told him rather seriously that handling firearms while people were downrange was a huge problem. He realized his foolishness and I will probably go shooting with him next time I have a chance. The guy is an awesome guy, why waste a friendship over a mistake that didn't hurt anyone. Plus after our brief talk he probably remembered all the safety briefings at his Navy range.

 

[sigchick88]

About 2 weeks ago we went to the range and every one was having a good time. While we were there a couple came up and were strutting around, thinking they were hot <removed>. Well the range went cold and the woman was strutting right up to the lane to start firing! There were people on the range! She loaded one into the chamber and took up aim! We are ALL yelling COLD at them but they weren't listening so a friend ran over to explain what cold and hot were.... Needless to say they left and I haven't seen them since!

 

[alienbogey]

wulfhart's firecracker story reminded me of this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=miBMb43x3Yw

 

[Babarsac]

I was on a business trip in Utah and decided to check out the Impact Guns store. I've been thinking about getting a GSG-5 to plink with and lo-and-behold they had one to rent. I purchased 100 rounds on WWB and headed into the back. There was a tactical training class going on but they had one lane left open. The trainer and a few of the trainees told me they were interested to see how the rifle shot so they stepped over to watch.

...oh man the pressure's on now

First magazine ran just fine and grouped rather well. With the second magazine I had a piece of brass bounce off the side of the lane (thin lane and I'm a lefty) and get wedged under my collar. I quickly safety and lay down the rifle and try to swat out the brass while doing a jig.

Instead the brass goes down the back of my shirt.

Which is tucked in.

The brass lands in...lets call it the canyon, and next thing I know I'm doing a full on River-dance at a gun range in Utah. Finally I got the bugger out and recompose myself. It must have been a sign of things to come because after the dance the GSG turned into a complete jam-o-matic and I could barely get five consecutive shots off.

 

[JG727]

Time to resurrect this great thread

The first item in today lineup..... My Screw Up!
I'm slightly hard of hearing (I have trouble focusing on sounds and thus tend to lose words in the background noise.) But I do hear the cease-fire command come over the loudspeaker. Then I hear "the line is cold, the range is safe. You may now go down range to service your targets. Please center all targets on the target placards and remain standing behind the yellow line when you return. Do not handle any firearms at this time." So I do just what the nice man says. Except I get yelled at by a bunch of RO's. Turns out the one time my hearing does work well is when the newbie RO is practicing his spiel, reading from a script with the loud speaker off.
Was it my fault? Absolutely, I should have noticed that no one else was going down range and that the RO's were still checking benched firearms.

Bonus points to the person who can tell me what range uses that script

 

[Unistat]

...Instead the brass goes down the back of my shirt.

Which is tucked in.

The brass lands in...lets call it the canyon, and next thing I know I'm doing a full on River-dance at a gun range in Utah. Finally I got the bugger out and recompose myself. It must have been a sign of things to come because after the dance the GSG turned into a complete jam-o-matic and I could barely get five consecutive shots off.

Hot brass down the shirt is just good training. Ignore it and keep shooting.

 

[zdc1775]

Ok here is my story. While at infantry training in North Carolina we were praticing fire-team rushes and one of the riflemen in the first team of my squad jumped up and ran at 45* to the direction he was supposed to and crossed the line of fire of a M-249 before the gunner or the RSO noticed it. Needless to say he took three rounds into his lower right leg. Horrrible incident that cost the Corps three otherwise good Marines.

 

[LJ-MosinFreak-Buck]

Well this one happened to me about a month ago, and it is the last time I took said individual shooting (after laying into him heavily, of course).

Me and quite a few buddies were out shooting, and since all have gone shooting with me before, and knew my rules, I didn't give my usual lecture. We were all blasting away, and it was a fun day.

I told everyone to unload and set down the guns so I could go put some new targets up on the stand. The range is only about 75 yards end to end. I get to the stand, remove the old target, and just as I finish putting a new target in, BANG!

Round lands about three feet to my right and up hill some. I turn around to see my former buddy laughing his ass off holding my Mosin. Needless to say, I walked back to the line, stripped my rifle from his hands and told him to leave, and that in no way was that funny. He got mad, saying it was just a joke and that he knew he wasn't going to hit me, but that was beside the point.

I didn't notice until after he walked back to his car, but one of my other buddies had him at gun point. I told him that I didn't want to see that again, either. He obeyed, and we all continued shooting, though it wasn't as fun after that. We headed home shortly after.

 

[HOWARD J]

I was at the state range that I usually go to.
You are supposed to clean up your spent cases before you leave.
The guy next to me was shooting 22 mags--his cases kept rolling under my bench.
When I would stand up I would almost fall over standing on those cute cases.
I started kicking some of the cases out of my way & the ranger told me to stop kicking
those cases forward because they went on to the grass in front of our benches & he had to clean them up.
Then the guy shooting the cases told me to stop kicking the cases around as he had to clean them up.
The guy shooting the cases gets up & leaves( talking to the ranger before he goes)
As this is the age of being political correct--the ranger never asked him to clean up his cases.
Guess who had to clean up both bench areas.
I would love to go back to the 50's.

 

[Capt. Ct.]

I saw a guy bring a .45 cal handgun that he had rented back to the range officer. He was complaining that this stupid gun was no good because all the ammo was falling out of it. The mags wouldn't hold the ammo properly. The RO tells him that it is because he is trying to use .40 cal ammo.

 

[Reasoned1]

When I was a young Army lieutenant almost twenty years ago, I had to function as range OIC one day. Well, my Battalion Commander--who was a bit of a dandy--shows up to qualify with his Beretta M9. Now get this, as he stands on the line, he starts pushing his helmet back WITH THE MUZZLE OF HIS WEAPON! Thank goodness he only did it a few times and I managed to get him out of there quick, because my range NCOIC was having an absolute conniption in the range control tower.

 

[Buck Kramer]

My friend came with, wanting to "learn how to shoot." After about 20 min of instruction I gave him the gun. He cocked it at about 90 degrees and unloaded the whole mag as fast as he could. I didn't even bother starting over, we just left.

 

[MtnCreek]

Probably a little different than the other posts, but this was the dumbest thing I ever saw a the range.

I'm at my local doing a little AR open site shooting at 50 yds. A guy and his son came to the line (guy looked to be about 30+yrs, son about 12). This guy had a new 17 cal rimfire and he acted like a kid at Christmas. He shot this rifle for about an hour, the whole time his son was being respectfull and asking to shoot it. The guy never let his son fire a shot; he acted like his son was just a bother and the son had a really sad look. This really pissed me off. I talked to the son a little and after asking the dads permission, offered to let the son shoot my ar (the kid was eyeballing it pretty heavy). The kid declined, seemed he thought it would have a lot of recoil or was just scared for what ever reason. (and fyi: I was going to load singles in mags for him) The father (using the term loosely), wanted to shoot my rifle after his son declined, but I was 'running short on time'.

This <jerk> was so focused on his new toy, he was willing to hurt his son (knowing or un-knowing, don't really make much difference to me). This was probably four years ago and I still think about it from time to time.

 

[Gig 'em]

MtnCreek, I have to say that I have seen something like this before. As a father, I am very saddened. I don't know that I would call the situation dumb so much as sad. A great opportunity to have some quality father-son time at the range lost over the dad's poor choice. I hope that he takes a hint before those moments are gone.
-Gig 'em-

 

[jgiehl]

Few years ago there was a guy at the end of the line and we're all shooting, line was about half full. All we're hearing is gunfire (naturally) then all of a sudden we hear this LOUD yell. We all look left and a few of us start running over thinking this idiot blew his face off. When we run up we ask if he's ok and he pops up with a huge grin on his face all excited that he "hit the target!!"
One of the worst things to do on a range.

 

[ThatGuyHank]

1- I was at the nearest indoor gun range (I think I should mention that you don't need a gun license to rent at the range, bad idea if you ask me but I don't own the place) and I was talking to the owner about how his shipment of ammo is being delayed by inclimate weather (BAD winter) when a gang-banger-esque guy comes storming into the counter area, rented 1911 being swung in every direction with its slide locked back and an immediately apparent double feed. He begins slamming it on the counter and yelling at the owner about how "The gun must be out of batteries or sumthin"

2- I was shooting in the same range and everything was going pretty fine. Then a group of guys maybe 2-3 years older than me all went to one lane/booth and set up a target about 10ft (NOT yards) away. They stick on those little "shoot and see" targets on each corner of the sillhouette target and load up their handgun (I think it was a smith and wesson 6904 but I'm not sure) and start shooting at one of the upper targets. First off, their groupings were disgustingly terrible at such a short range. Secondly, one of the angled shots hit my target hanger and ricocheted. Right after I was greeted with a 9mm slug burrowed halfway into my forearm and searing hot. I pulled it out quick and i bled pretty good. Talked to the owner and they got moving pretty quick. I shot all day long after bandaging it. Now I have a scar that looks like an oversized cigarette burn to remind me of how stupid people can be.

To be honest I've made my fair share of mistakes and being only 18 I have a feeling I may make a couple more. My worst one was when I was shooting my dads Phoenix .22 (I know the opinions on it but it's as accurate as I could possibly ask any firearm to be) and a hot casing went down the back of my shirt. Needless to say I panicked and started trying to get it out but still had the gun in my hand. Thankfully my dad grabbed my hand and pointed it down range (No discharge by the way, kept my finger off the trigger. For some reason I do this thing that my instructors told me was unorthodox-I use all four of my fingers, trigger finger included, to pick the gun up by its grip and then open the hand a little to let the trigger level at my shooting finger- probably saved someones life).

 

[KingMedicine]

Well, i was not at a range, but outside of Boise is a huge plot of land (like 440,000 acres) that is owed by the National Guard. Its free range to go out and shoot. So we set up a firing range on a flat peice of land, but a light hill backstop to stop any stray rounds. We shoot for a few hours until i look over and actually see two people bird hunting walking OVER out hill downrange. I jump on everyone to pull there rifles, but they proceeded to walk around for 20 minutes chit chatting while we waited for them to mosey off range.

It was darn obvious we were shooting and they could see us for miles, but alas, they didnt really matter they were pacing in our line of fire.

 

[Joe Vaquero]

Ok, not at the range, but I know a guy who decided to slip his flip-flops on and go shoot his 12ga in the backyard. He was carrying the gun muzzle down by his right side and was bouncing the muzzle on the top of his foot. The gun discharged and he had a neat 12ga size hole through the top of his foot. Ended up with a couple of titanium toes and a permanent limp.

 

[Cokeman]

Got what he deserved?

 

[MikeNice]

Saturday I decided to do some shooting before work. I went over to a family member's house to shoot. They have a nice area on their property with a large thick hill for a back stop. I was in the middle of emptying a 30 round clip of old 22lr ammo. This guy comes walking over the hill directly behind the target. I imediately put the safety on and pulled the rifle in across my chest.

He walked down hill directly torwards the target and then around it. He came up to me and demanded I stop shooting because I was disturbing his bird watching activities on the other side of the hill. I informed him that he was on private property and had no room to make demands. He called the cops to report my "discharing a firearm in the direction of a person."

Needless to say it took the deputies about three minutes to get there in full code 3. They came out of the car with guns in hand thinking they had an active shooter situation. I put my rifle on the ground and raised my hands. One of the deputies recognized me and asked if I was the one that called in. The guy stormed past me and approached the deputies screaming and waving his hands. In seconds he was eating gravel.

He was told to clear out and informed that making a false report is illegal. He was also told if he ever steps foot on that property again he would be arrested.

 

[WeedWacker]

Bonus points to the person who can tell me what range uses that script

Exchange yellow line for red line and that is about exactly what the RO's at the Lapwai, ID range use.

I actually had an idiot moment myself yesterday. Heard the call that the range would go cold in 1 minute and saw the flashing lights. Everyone else was getting away from the bench and grabbing extra targets to change out. I figure everyone was done and take off my muffs and my ear plugs just in time to have this guy touch off his .300 win mag right behind me. I hope my ears never ring like that ever again.....

 

[tpelle]

I was at a range once quite a few years ago now - It happened to be near a big Army base and there were always lots of fit young guys with high and tight haircuts around. One time there was this real body builder type there in fatigue pants and boots and one of those Underarmor tight tee-shirts, showing off his muscles (I think he was the only person that I've ever seen that looked like he muscles in his ears! But the best thing was, he had his girlfriend with him who was uber-hot! Looked like a twin to Angelina Jolie in Tomb Raider. Super fit, washboard abs, wearing an extremely low-cut tank top and spandex shorts.

These two looked like they should have been the little statues on top of Arnold Schwarzenegger's wedding cake, you know what I mean?

They had a tricked-out AR15, and I do have to admit that the girl knew what she was doing - using a sling and shooting from all three positions, and I checked out her target with my spotting scope and she was putting some pretty tight groups on the target. The boyfriend had an expensive SLR camera and mainly was taking lots of pics of her while she was doing it, too.

The remarkable thing about this girl was she was very flexible, and could get into a super low sitting position. The lowest I have EVER seen.....to the point that, well, two of her finest features would just about touch the ground.

It was hard to keep your focus on the front sight, if you know what I mean.

Anyway, there was this other guy there, kind of a pudgy pimply young guy, who was shooting an 8mm K98. The girl would crack off a few 5.56 NATOs, then the guy with the K98 would cut loose with this big BOOM!

Finally the girl came over and asked the guy if she could shoot the Mauser. Let me tell you, Mauser-boy was in Heaven! He told her all about the rifle, how to load it, how to work the bolt, everything. He was loving it, and the girl really seemed to be paying attention and asking question if she didn't understand something.

So finally the girl gets down in her sitting position, puts that big ol' head-cracker of a solid steel buttplate against her shoulder, and cuts loose! BOOM! She hollers, and drops the rifle, and starts rolling around and moaning. I was an EMT at the time, so I safed my rifle and went over to see what she hurt, and from what I could see she broke her right collarbone! I guess her position was so low that the buttplate of that Mauser was right on her collarbone when she fired it! The AR didn't kick enough to bother her.

I felt bad, because it was kind of something I felt like I should have noticed, but honestly, like everybody else I admit to being sort of distracted.

Anyway, I made a field-expedient sling out of the boyfriends tee shirt, and immobilized her arm to her side with another shirt that he had in his truck, and the boyfriend loaded her in the truck to take her to the ER.

The Mauser guy was devastated! Probably the hottest, best looking girl that ever actually spoke a word other than "Creep!" to him, and he broke her!