Shooting indoors...Will it blind and deafen you???

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My neighbor ND'd a 229 in 40S&W into my wood floor, while I was standing next to him. We were near a corner, so the acoustics were against us, too. The lights were on but rather dim (it was around 9pm). I was not wearing any protection, and did not anticipate the shot at all.

I don't remember a flash. I do remember it being loud enough that my ears had a good, hard ring for a few minutes. When the adrenaline wore off my ears hurt a little, I just remember how loud it was, the ring, and how quiet everything seemed for the next few minutes. In the morning everything seemed back to normal. I get my hearing checked regularly and it's pretty good.

The best way to describe the after feeling... if you've ever been to a loud concert, and then on the car ride home your head feels a little fuzzy and everything's a little muffled... a day or two later all's back to normal. That was pretty close.

When it happened, the adrenaline shot was huge. It was incredibly startling. The noise was louder than I thought it would be, but my ears didn't fall off and I didn't go blind.
 
Properly inserted plugs have at least as good of db reduction as most muffs. Often better. The problem comes in when people don't insert them fully or properly.
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Wear both -- a properly sealing set of muffs over properly fitted ear plugs.

When you lose hearing, you can't get it back.
 
I have shot indoors once with no protection. It was a 9mm, and I only got out 5-6 shots before I quit. My ears rang for the whole next day. It was physically painful each shot. This was in an 15X20X9 ft concrete basement. I wasn't def, but you did have to annunciate to be understood. Flash was un-noticed because the lights were on.
 
A specific question I'm curious about in addition to the ones asked by the OP is:

Were you able to have a conversation immediately/shortly after?

Especially curious if you had a phone conversation and whether you were able to understand the other person.
 
I fired a .25 Baby Browning indoors (basement level of a shop) without ear protection while trying to apprehend a robber who had stabbed a security guard.
Admittedly this was a mousegun, but it was pretty damn loud! This was a well-lit shop and there were no adverse visual effects.
I can't remember any ringing from that incident.
 
Yeah, your ears are going to ring, and you will experience hearing loss, possibly severe and permenent. So far the flash hasn't messed me up too much during shooting. I heartily recommend NOT picking short barreled .357's or .44 mags for personal defense, with full, hypervelocity loads. Some loadings burn a lot of powder OUTSIDE the barrel, resulting in a flash way bigger than it needs to be. Subsonic loads are ALSO better for reduding the "crack"/blast from handguns. I feel the big bores at subsonic velocities with heavy bullets is the best compromise for self defense in confined areas (including vehicles). If you are a bodyguard, VIP protection ,etc, and have to shoot from vehicles, for instance. I can't even imagine a short barreled rifle inside a house. Or a Krinkov. I had a breech blow open on a subcaliber insert while being fired in a break open shotgun in a confined area (I was fring from a port in a low ceiling building. My hearing is now a permanent ringing/hissing sound, making it hard to articulate voices in a crowded room, or with other background noises. It's a trade off, as you can use blockout type electronic muffs, etc, but you might handicap yourself in some other way.
 
Good article:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/bv.fcgi?rid=hstat4.section.6170

Important part:

Generally, for sound levels below about 140 dB, different temporal forms of sound, whether impulse (gunshot), impact (drop forge) or steady state (turbine), when specified with respect to their level and duration, produce the same hearing loss. This does not appear to follow at levels above 140 dB, where impulse noise creates more damage than would be predicted. This may imply that impulse noise above a certain critical level results in acoustic trauma from which the ear cannot recover.
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A gun shot is an impulse noise. Many are above 140dB.
 
I was all alone in the indoor range where I shoot a lot. I thought I'd try a round or two of .22LR from my pistol to see what it was like. It only took ONE round to make me realize that the muffs or plugs are an excelllent idea. Being a .22 it didn't leave me with my ears ringing or dull for any time but it sure did "sting" a bit and there was no need to try a second round without muffs.


But as mentioned many times range use is a FAR step away from home defense use. But given the huge difference between something like .38Spl and .357Mag I can certainly see the sense in using a lower "boomy" round than a super loud one. Expecting a loud report and being hit with the report from a .357 are sort of two different cases.
 
I shot several pistols in enclosed rooms without hearing protection. The 357 Mag load made my ears ring for several days; 45ACP was loud but not dibilitating. The flash of both was noticable but not distracting.

It's mainly just LOUD.
 
I have had occasion to fire primed cases inside from a revolver, and even a primer going off in a small room is surprisingly loud. Once, quite a while ago, I had to de-prime a .45 Colt case which had wound up being primed before being sized (this was back in the days when all I had was a Lee hand loader, and an RCBS priming tool.) So I took the case, put a cleaning patch into it, took my single-action into the bathroom, filled a bucket with water and pointed the revolver down at the bucket. The noise of the discharge was startlingly loud, and I wound up dripping wet for my trouble. Had that been a fully-loaded live round, I'm certain it would've set my ears to ringing. Simply having my earplugs work loose while at an indoor range lets the sound of firing got loud enough to be distracting . . . back when I started shooting. Not so much these days.

As for the flash? Not so bad. The indoor range I used to shoot at was, all things considered, quite dark. While some practice ammo, and most handloads would produce a bright yellow flash of light, it wasn't near bright enough to interfere with acquiring the target. Even a 4" .44 Magnum doesn't seem to produce enough flash to do that. Were the range only night-light bright, it'd be a different story, but much of the self-defense stuff I practice with and carry produces little flash.
 
I fired an original Remington XP-100 in .221 Fireball while sitting on a couch, out the open window across the room, at a big stray dog that had been touring the neighborhood for several days, wreaking havoc. No vision worries, big flash, but daytime, ears rang for several hours. The muzzle blast knocked a picture off the wall, which broke the frame and glass when it hit the floor, and also killed an expensive desktop CB microphone in the room. The dog was drt with a high shoulder shot.

That was in my mid teens, over 30 years ago. I've always been pretty careful about hearing protection at the range, and for my age, I have better than average hearing.
 
Had an ND with a Beretta 21A and Stingers. Gun was pointed in a safe direction and luckily the bullet didn't manage to penetrate the top of a particle board desk, but the gun was only about a foot from my face when it went off (unsuppressed, of course). No blindness, but it was daylight in a well lit room. But deafness, yes, for a couple of minutes at least. Heard nothing much else than ringing ears and my own cursing for awhile.

I think I was too shocked to notice if it was painful, but it probably was. Absolutely not something I would want to repeat.

jm

ps. I'm anal enough about it now that I wear earplugs when driving on the interstate with the windows down. I already have some hearing loss that impacts my life, I don't want to make it worse if I can help it.
 
Jeez -

I can think of another, much older, scenario

Which leaves you blind and deaf and sterile too........

But I won't go there right now.

The point to me is, yeah,

Use protective gear when target shooting.

Makes sense.

If the **** goes down, you are

1.) Probably gonna want to have 1 in the tube

and

2.) Have no time to put on ear protective gear.


Anyone out there seen a CCW holster for a set of earmuffs?


isher
 
I went to an outdoor range with my 12ga loaded up with slugs, forgot to don my muffs and didn't notice as I was the only one there. The lanes are partially separated by hard panels, which helps reflect the sound.

One shot and all I heard from both ears was ringing, loud with nothing else. Some seconds later the ringing began to subside, more in my left ear than my right ear. Ever play Call of Duty 2? They got the sound just right when a grenade goes off nearby. My right ear filled with fluid for weeks after, and still rings loudly months later. Volume is noticeably less on my right side, though either I'm compensating better for it or my hearing is gradually getting better. Likely as a result of less fluid in there.

Double up your protection. Plugs and some amplifying muffs so you can still hear the range master. Your hearing is precious.
 
9mm, .45acp and 5.56X45 for me. The handgun rounds didn't give any problems with flash, no real noticeable effect on vision. This wasn't in darkness, just dim light. I imagine darkness would have an entirely different effect. The effect on my ears was as if someone had reached over and stuffed cotton in my ears. I could still hear and carry on a conversation, but everything was a bit muffled for a short while. The M-16s on the other hand, were another story. Flash wasn't too terribly bad but did have a bit more effect on vision that the handguns. Not debillitating or anything, but noticeable. The sound, however, was awfull. A half dozen rifles dumping rapid fire in a small concrete room will make you sit up and take notice. Hearing was immediately and noticeably impaired. We all said "Huh?" a lot for a few days. The Automatic Rifleman in our squad dumped about half a magazine and it was an earsplitting sound, I had the distinct impression that if that had gone on much longer it might have made me nauseous. OTOH, a few rounds fired at intervals during training drills did not have the same effect. Very loud, but not in the same ballpark.

And yes, I have permenant and somewhat substantial hearing damage due to gunfire, aircraft and heavy equipment. I have mild tinnitus, am nearly deaf to certain tones and some sounds make my head split immediately.
 
I shot a .40 S&W outdoors with no protection once, that was enough for me.

I don't want to know what it would have sounded like indoors!
 
I've shot off a 125 grain JHP .357 out of 2 1/8" snub nose indoors (not a large open space like an indoor range either).

No problems with the flash, it was bright out.


I think the percussive blast rendered my ears dead before they were hit by the supersonic crack....who know? But hearing did returned to totally normal shortly after with not much ringing.... I can probably thank all those metal concerts I attended throughout my life for 'conditioning' my ears....
 
May 6th, 2009, 11:04 AM #10
Vern Humphrey
Ringingin the ears for any time at all after exposure to noise is a sign of permanent damage.
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Incorrect. I don't know if you're medically qualified or not (I don't think so otherwise you would have used the word symptom - that which the patient complains of - as opposed to sign - that which on examination can be seen) but I am and can say that ringing of the ears that has been caused by any loud impulse noise does not cause permanent damage to one's hearing. If the impulse noise was both loud enough and close enough to the ear the person would have (in layman's terms) ruptured ear drums with no ringing. Repetative high level DBa impulse noise (note - impulse noise) over a lengthy period of time can cause such damage in some individuals but not all that have been so exposed.

Please note that I wear muffs when at the range etcetera but I seriously doubt that anyone would have either the time or the concern to reach for them were they to suddenly find an unexpected BG in the house or bedroom. Adrenaline is a wonderful thing :)
 
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I am and can say that ringing of the ears that has been caused by any loud impulse noise does not cause permanent damage to one's hearing.
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Then every audiologist in the Army is wrong, because that's what I was told at every annual audiogram.
 
I am and can say that ringing of the ears that has been caused by any loud impulse noise does not cause permanent damage to one's hearing.
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I am and can say the above is incorrect, false, a lie, untrue and wrong.
 
The reason I know this is that 1 (yes a single yet very loud) impulse noise left me with a permanent 30db 3 kHz ringing in my ears.
 
jmorris said:

I am and can say the above is incorrect, false, a lie, untrue and wrong.
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1. You may accuse me of anything you wish but not of telling a lie. Please do not be so objectionable.
2. You speak from a personal experience - I speak from many years of experience of of dealing with such instances.
3. You now have tinnitus which may be caused by such impulse noise as well as many other factors. The impulse may well have been a trigger. Does tinnitis run in your family - it did in mine so I know how you feel.

Vern said:

Then every audiologist in the Army is wrong, because that's what I was told at every annual audiogram.
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Have you seen and been examined by every audiologist in the army?

Look guys, there are exceptions to every rule and in the case of medicine their are no exacting rules and that's one of the reasons why you will frequently get a different diagnosis from different doctors. If medicine was a black and white science (which it is definitely not) then every doctor would agree - but they don't. Would you call one a liar if his medical opinion and diagnosis differed from another - I sincerely hope not.

I will repeat my assertion in a modified form if you wish : it is EXTREMELY UNLIKELY that a single or even a repetative loud impulse noise that is BELOW the threshold of danger (a physiological and anatomical VARIABLE between individuals) will cause permanent hearing damage. Individual responses will vary just as they vary in their responses to treatments - e.g. a given drug regime will work for one patient and damage another (please look up idiopathic and iatrogenic). There are no absolutes. The OP asked for comments and I made mine based not just upon my own personal experience but that of many other people. I'm sorry that your experiences have been different.
 
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