Texas Gun Range

[crabo]

If you've ever wondered what it might be like to shoot at targets with a military-style rifle from a helicopter, you might want to take a trip to Denton, TX. Helicoptersniper.com will, for just under $800, take you on a 15 minute flight over their gun range for just such an "adventure."

The business has generated some familiar arguments, according to television station WFAA. Company owner Dan Claasen told the station that what they are doing is perfectly safe ... "like the ultimate video game." He says that no one's life is in danger from the activity.
Michael Lauer, who lives near the operation, has a different perspective. He told the station that it has turned the neighborhood into a "war zone."
Claasen said that there is not an airborne client every day, and that his helicopter is "the world's safest and quietest." Lauer said that the first time they flew, they were "hovering right over our two acres shooting at whatever."
While local authorities and the FAA say there is nothing illegal about firing weapons from the aircraft, Lauer and others who live near the range are considering legal action against the company.

[Down South]

The urbanites are at it again.

[WILCO]

http://www.helicoptersniper.com/

[texassako]

I saw those news clips the other day. One was a slightly ticked off cattle rancher neighbor who was mostly angry about them not being neighborly about letting him know before they started shooting near his cattle. It has happened before around here. Others on the north side of DFW might remember Backwoods Traps. Nice facility that had a big development go up across highway (Savanna). They were pretty much forced to sell out to the Huffines development group by lawsuits and the homeowners, but I heard they at least forced Huffines to buy the business as well as the land($$$). If a place that existed long before the homeowners can be forced out, then I would not bet on the helicopter being around for long. There are some deep pocketed people in the area they picked that can hold a grudge.

[crawfobj]

I've shot at that range for my CHL renewal. The berms are huge and completely around the property. The videos show that they're basically flying at or below berm level when they're shooting. The helicopter noise has to drown out the rifles.

I was wondering what happened to Backwoods. They had a nice facility out there that is now just sitting vacant. What a waste.

Some people just look for things to complain about.

[km101]

This will probably be another of the "disappearing ranges" around here. Backwoods Traps is gone. Garland Public Shooting Range is being forced out by lawsuits, and Quail Creek has had to cut back operations because of complaints from new neighbors. This is a really disturbing trend.

And if someone with deep pockets objects to the helicopter, or the noise, or the possible danger, then this range will be gone too!

[crabo]

I saw those news clips the other day. One was a slightly ticked off cattle rancher neighbor who was mostly angry about them not being neighborly about letting him know before they started shooting near his cattle. It has happened before around here. Others on the north side of DFW might remember Backwoods Traps. Nice facility that had a big development go up across highway (Savanna). They were pretty much forced to sell out to the Huffines development group by lawsuits and the homeowners, but I heard they at least forced Huffines to buy the business as well as the land($$$). If a place that existed long before the homeowners can be forced out, then I would not bet on the helicopter being around for long. There are some deep pocketed people in the area they picked that can hold a grudge.

I always wondered what happened to Backwoods Traps.

[Bad Water Bill]

Living near Chit Kaga I have seen countless ranges go the same way. One was closed because a farmer brought a spent PB 45 cal to the Co sheriff and said "this just bounced off my tractor as I was plowing". Funny the boolit was covered in mud and the range was still closed.

A new housing development was started next spring.

The Illinois state rifle range has been at its location for a century or so. Miles from any town and on a 2 lane highway. I do not know how many times land developers have tried to shut them down so far.

Probably want the nice timbered property more than anything else. It would sell for way more than the corn fields that have sprouted up since the range was started.

[DCP]

Sounds like a hole lot of fun.

[popper]

Garland Public Shooting Range fees going from $10 to $15/day/person beginning July 1, 2013.

[TX.shotgun01]

Its bad when we can't even go out to have fun at the local range without some suit getting (his or hers) panties twisted all up in there A**. Maybe if they would go out and see what it is all about then maybe they to can see how fun it really is, and let us play with our toys in peace. I say if you want to go out and shoot up a few rounds at the range and someone don't like the noise then they need to move to somewhere that is not around a range. That's my thinking of it!

[Bad Water Bill]

I landed at Orchard Field Dec 1956 and it was so far in the boonies only the pilot knew how to get near Chit Kags.

5 years later under the banner O HARE FIELD there still was only a 2 lane highway and corn fields as far as you could see.

All kinds of businesses moved in then came the family dwellings and INSTANT protests about "those noisy planes".

I have no idea how many hundreds of millions it cost the government to soundproof all of those structures.

This set a precedent that "yes I knew the range was there when I bought the place,so what?

Stop that noise.

[popper]

BWB Carswell has been here for >50 yrs, but the state had to buy off developers around the base 2 yrs ago. They don't plan ahead much.

[Bad Water Bill]

There has been discussion for many years to put another airport in Chit Kaga land.

The ONLY thing I do approve about the project is a 2 mile thick berm of forest preserve on ALL 4 sides to provide a sound barrier.

Yes buying that much extra land will be very expensive BUT over the last 50 years Taxpayers probably would have been better off if a total berm had been provided at the time the blue prints were approved.

[grumman581]

The problem is that we need to secure our borders. Not the southern border, but the eastern, western, and northern borders were the Damn Yankees sneak in here after getting tired of shoveling snow and bring their disgusting habits with them. Next thing you know, they have lacrosse teams in the schools, professional hockey teams, and they're trying to convince us that BBQ consists of something other than beef brisket. :(

We need to evict the whole bunch of them. Make them go back up north and fix the mess that they created instead of bringing it down to us.

[Recluse]

The problem is that we need to secure our borders. Not the southern border, but the eastern, western, and northern borders were the Damn Yankees sneak in here after getting tired of shoveling snow and bring their disgusting habits with them. Next thing you know, they have lacrosse teams in the schools, professional hockey teams, and they're trying to convince us that BBQ consists of something other than beef brisket. :(

We need to evict the whole bunch of them. Make them go back up north and fix the mess that they created instead of bringing it down to us.

+1

People outside of Texas wonder why we don't just hate damn yankees, but despise them with an almost incomprehensible passion.

We have two other areas in the north DFW area that are under assault by these (expletive deleted) transplants. One is a place called Little Elm, which sits on the north/northeast side of Lake Lewisville and which for years prior to the invasion of the transplants had been a quiet little township of its own.

But then the damn yankees and Kalifornicators moved in because we have jobs in Texas and they don't. They don't have jobs in their dunghole areas because they did and supported everything possible to run businesses off. So now they come to the Lone Star State. They initially buy a house (or rent) for a year or so in the city, then go looking in the far-reaching suburbs. In the case of Little Elm, they "discovered" it and liked it because it had lakefront property, easy access to a 30,000 acre developed lake, yah yah yah.

It didn't even take a year before traffic lights started going in, then a McDonalds, then a friggin' Walmart and even a (expletive deleted) Starbucks. Today, you can't even recognize Little Elm for what it used to be.

The other area is Haslet, which is near our airport (Hicks Airfield). Fifteen years ago, it was solid and pure country west of I-35 and north of US Hwy 287. We had untold dozens and dozens of square miles of land all around us.

Fast forward to today and the (expletive deleted) land developers have put in wall-to-wall housing and predictably, the damned yankees and Kalifornicators and transplants are starting to gripe about the airplane noise and the potential "safety hazards." Some of the hangar owners at Hicks, which is a privately owned airport but open to the public, have tried to appease these yankee transplants and befriend them and offer up compromises. The more they offer, the more the damned yankees demand.

I'm all for putting a fence up around the Red River, the Sabine River and all along the New Mexico border. Oklahomans are welcome as they've always been good neighbors and so has Louisiana and Arkansas, although we still haven't forgiven New Orleans for Katrina and the human trash it dumped on us.

:coffee:

[crawfobj]

Recluse,

I'm a firm believer in the fence plan you described. I'd even volunteer to help build it. Can't think of a better way to spend weekends and vacation time than that.

I'm just south of Little Elm, btw, and its insane how much the area has changed just in the last 10 years.

[Bad Water Bill]

Well there goes one state I can not move to.

Been sitting in the dark AGAIN and thinking of looking for somewhere I would be welcome.

Well there are a few more to consider where I might be welcome in my old age.

Thanks for saving me some moving money.

[grumman581]

Well there goes one state I can not move to.

Been sitting in the dark AGAIN and thinking of looking for somewhere I would be welcome.

Well there are a few more to consider where I might be welcome in my old age.

Thanks for saving me some moving money.

Don't take it personal, but we've just had a long experience with Yankee carpetbaggers coming down here and screwing up our culture. We find it safer to just hate all of them.

Besides, you wouldn't like our summers anyway... 95F, 95% humidity, 9 months out of the year...

[grumman581]

Garland Public Shooting Range fees going from $10 to $15/day/person beginning July 1, 2013.

One of the things that I've noticed with a lot of the shooting ranges these days is that they require a membership fee. Some are a minimal one like the Garland range ($10), others are considerably more. This is especially inconvenient for out-of-towners who just happen to be visiting in the area since it makes the range time more expensive. Used to be you never even saw a gun range that operated like that. They were always operated like any other store -- you showed up with your money and you paid the same price as everyone else did.

I was up in Iowa a few years ago and the state actually had a FREE gun range between Cedar Rapids and Iowa City, in the flood plain of the Iowa River, on the west side of I-380. Basically, they carved out one face of a hill and that was the backstop.

https://maps.google.com/?ll=41.807477,-91.710922&spn=0.001999,0.005284&t=h&z=18

Never did really see all that many people there when I went down there... There was no range safety officer or anything... Basically a completely uncontrolled range, but I never saw any problems while I was there... I wish that we had that sort of thing around here. We *used* to have places where people would dump trash and you could just go there and shoot tin cans, but those are classified as "illegal dump sites" these days, so you don't see them as often.