Did I do something wrong? Range question

[Ramcharger]

I would have said yes sir, sorry sir and thats it.
Sorry but he has to deal with a whole lot of imcompotent aholes every day.
I shoot every other weekend at my local range and I'm apalled by how careless and stupid people get. And then they get offened and angry when the RO catches them and tells em. Theres always some knuckle head that leaves a loaded gun on the table. The ROs pull the slide or bolt back and oops! Out pops a live round.

You stand here saying he was too tough you. Yet if the guy next to you dropped his "unloaded" rifle while trying to set it on the rack and it fired sending a 30-06 in your leg you you be the hopping mad on you good leg and suing him and the shooting range because the RO was negligent and incompetent and didnt do his job! Remember these are firearms not toys. They will kill. People seem to forget them sometime.

[6shooter]

The Range man was out of line. I'm a member of a range and have never heard of such behavior. We police ourselves when on the range as to when to cease fire and hang targets. The only time there is a range officer is when we have touraments. I understand not messing with the guns at the bench, but just putting the gun on the rack behind the line? The range man was out of line.

[moredes]

I've been an RO at 3 different ranges over the 30 years. Yes, you did something wrong, you crossed the line when the range was cold. No excuses are acceptable, especially from someone claiming to understand and practice proper "house rules".

The RO you dealt with was an ass from your point of view, (and all the sheep who've never heard a gun go off amongst a crowd on a cold line unintentionally will back you), but that doesn't excuse your behaviour either. My bet is the RO missed seeing you rack your rifle behind the line and only saw you place the ammo on the table. That set of circumstances, coupled with the fact that you didn't cop to handling *something* on the table, escalated the entire incident into an 'argument'. Your description says the RO was "some distance away" when he hollered at you while you were at the table. (How 'action-opened' guns are handled from vehicle-to-rack during a cease-fire is a variable according to "house rules". At two of the ranges I RO'd, handling *any* iron was taboo during the cold period; at the 3rd range, the only entrance to the line funneled past the RO's best vantage point, and he could stop all incoming folks with a quick, "please wait here until" the line turned hot.)

If the shooting line is long, there's no way to see everything on the tables down the line; it's like standing obliquely next to a cyclone fence and trying to look through it; thick glasses or not (and you can belittle his eyesight as much as you please) he saw you cross the line, and made the worst assumption possible, which as an RO is the best assumption to make, at any distance. I thought he handled it well, waiting until the line was hot, to speak to you "privately", until you 'mutually' got out of hand. If my description of his impressions are correct, I lay no fault *whatsoever* on the RO. You better believe, I'd raise my voice and threaten to drop kick *anyone* out the door immediately if they stand and argue their safety conduct was proper, if their reason doesn't jibe with what I think I saw ("I was never handling a weapon with people downrange") --all you had to do was state that you'd racked your rifle and brainfarted your way to the table with ammo only, and I'm sure the whole situation would have diffused itself.

I'm glad not to have to screw around anymore with the obstinant idiots and self-righteous experts handling guns among strangers and neophytes. There's enough of them out there that a whole weekend didn't go by when we'd have to listen to "attitude" while performing this volunteer duty of keeping an assemblage of randomly gathered experts and neophytes safe during every minute of their (sub)conscious range use.

I'm sooo glad I don't have to use supervised ranges.

I shoot on my own property now, and the unknown quantity of a stranger with a gun on the firing line doesn't even enter into my shooting scenarios anymore. God is good.

[M1911]

RCP:

Here's the deal: guns can only go off when there are three things: 1) guns, 2) ammo, and 3) someone messing with them. That particular rule is stop people from messing with guns while people are downrange. People were downrange and you were moving a gun around. You broke their rule, end of story. So fess up and take it like a man.

I certainly understand why the range officer lost his patience with you when you started to argue with him. The rule says no handling of guns while people were downrange -- 1) there were people downrange and 2) you were handling a gun. He told you what you did wrong, but you didn't accept it. It's no surprise to me that he raised his voice.

Different clubs have different rules. You may or may not agree with the rule at that club about not handling guns when people are downrange. But the fact is, that is their rule. It doesn't matter that your gun was unloaded when you took it from the truck. The guns benched on the tables or in the rack were unloaded as well, weren't they? Accidental discharges almost always happen with guns that people thought were unloaded. Which is exactly why many clubs have this rule.

As long as no one handles a gun while people are downrange, then there is very little chance of a gun going off. In fact, at many clubs not only can you not handle a gun while people are downrange, but you also must step back behind a yellow line, 5+ feet from the benches. This type of rule makes it much, much easier for a single range officer to supervise a large range.

Next time have your rifle in a case. Don't uncase it until you've asked the range officer if you can bring a rifle onto the line.

You may not like it and you may not agree with it. However, that is their rule and you broke it -- obey it or find a different club.

M1911