oldred
05-08-2012, 10:54 AM
I just posted this in a discussion on shooting safety on another site but thought it worth posting again, safety should be a primary concern to all of us and a little reminder can't hurt. I did something really stupid (and I mean STUPID!) back in my younger days and I will tell this in hopes it makes someone think before being careless.
Some years back (well a LOT of years back) I was shooting at a paper target I had set up under a small hill that I thought was an adequate back stop as long as I was careful not to shoot over it. I was thinking "no way am I going to shoot 3 to 4 feet over the target" so the hill would be a safe back-stop, BUT!! What I did not notice was a flat rock directly behind the target and EVERY shot had ricocheted off that rock, went over the hill and across a highway! I was scared out of my wits and fully expected the police to come knocking looking for the sniper who had been shooting at cars, luckily nothing was mentioned on the news that evening but I sure learned a valuable lesson that time. That was back in the 70's and this is the first time I have told anyone about that incident but probably I should have before now. That was a fairly busy highway and I have no doubt at all that due to the angle of the ricochet those bullets were traveling across that highway about 2 to 4 feet of the ground and could easily have killed someone! Twenty shots (a full box) of 30/30 went across that road between passing cars!
Why would someone tell something like this on himself? Well like I said it was a dumb move caused by the urge to shoot my new rifle when there really was no safe place to shoot, the desire to shoot made me convince myself that what I was doing was safe when in fact it was not! If I had of been honest with myself I would have to have admitted the situation was dangerous but I made several mistakes. First I was unfamiliar with the area and although I knew the highway was there I thought is was well below that hill, still shooting in that direction was just plain dumb hill or not. My reasoning was that no way was I going to shoot high enough to clear the hill at that distance but I failed to take into account every possibility. Young and dumb is no excuse, NEVER,EVER take a risk no matter how slim the chance something could go wrong! If things can go wrong then all too often they will!!!!
Some years back (well a LOT of years back) I was shooting at a paper target I had set up under a small hill that I thought was an adequate back stop as long as I was careful not to shoot over it. I was thinking "no way am I going to shoot 3 to 4 feet over the target" so the hill would be a safe back-stop, BUT!! What I did not notice was a flat rock directly behind the target and EVERY shot had ricocheted off that rock, went over the hill and across a highway! I was scared out of my wits and fully expected the police to come knocking looking for the sniper who had been shooting at cars, luckily nothing was mentioned on the news that evening but I sure learned a valuable lesson that time. That was back in the 70's and this is the first time I have told anyone about that incident but probably I should have before now. That was a fairly busy highway and I have no doubt at all that due to the angle of the ricochet those bullets were traveling across that highway about 2 to 4 feet of the ground and could easily have killed someone! Twenty shots (a full box) of 30/30 went across that road between passing cars!
Why would someone tell something like this on himself? Well like I said it was a dumb move caused by the urge to shoot my new rifle when there really was no safe place to shoot, the desire to shoot made me convince myself that what I was doing was safe when in fact it was not! If I had of been honest with myself I would have to have admitted the situation was dangerous but I made several mistakes. First I was unfamiliar with the area and although I knew the highway was there I thought is was well below that hill, still shooting in that direction was just plain dumb hill or not. My reasoning was that no way was I going to shoot high enough to clear the hill at that distance but I failed to take into account every possibility. Young and dumb is no excuse, NEVER,EVER take a risk no matter how slim the chance something could go wrong! If things can go wrong then all too often they will!!!!