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A Clueless New Gun Owner

I got "shot" by an idiot at my local range over the summer when he was screwing around. He looked new and was yanking the trigger on his brand new AR as fast as he could at a 10-yard target. His target looked like it'd been hit with a shotgun. One of his stray rounds hit something metal downrange, came back, and embedded itself in my shirt. I gave him back his bullet, complained to the RO, and haven't been back. I saw other presumably new shooters flagging the line, pointing their new firearms at the ceiling, etc before my incident and the ROs rarely corrected them. It's getting crazy out there.

I don't consider myself an idiot, but at our local indoor range a couple years or so ago, one of my rounds apparently hit something on the back wall and richocheted. The guy next to me walked over and said "I think you shot me in the arm." It did not penetrate, just stung him. In talking with the range owner, he said that happens sometimes. There must be something about the range design that needs to be changed. I was back there several times before the range closed, and never had anything like that happen again. I was shooting 9mm FMJ practice ammo at 25yds. Even when you are careful, I guess strange things can happen. I still feel bad about that incident. I am thinking outdoor ranges may be better. Never had that happen outside.
 
I don't consider myself an idiot, but at our local indoor range a couple years or so ago, one of my rounds apparently hit something on the back wall and richocheted. The guy next to me walked over and said "I think you shot me in the arm." It did not penetrate, just stung him. In talking with the range owner, he said that happens sometimes. There must be something about the range design that needs to be changed. I was back there several times before the range closed, and never had anything like that happen again. I was shooting 9mm FMJ practice ammo at 25yds. Even when you are careful, I guess strange things can happen. I still feel bad about that incident. I am thinking outdoor ranges may be better. Never had that happen outside.
Without knowing the range design I couldn't respond on why it would happen or the how. I don't want to guess either!
 
I don't know either, TexasforLife, but in my mind, something about the design is wrong if that can happen. And I was being careful, hitting the target hanging from the hanger and not shooting fast. I'm just glad the rebound wasn't fast enough to penetrate the skin.
 
I don't consider myself an idiot, but at our local indoor range a couple years or so ago, one of my rounds apparently hit something on the back wall and richocheted. The guy next to me walked over and said "I think you shot me in the arm." It did not penetrate, just stung him. In talking with the range owner, he said that happens sometimes. There must be something about the range design that needs to be changed. I was back there several times before the range closed, and never had anything like that happen again. I was shooting 9mm FMJ practice ammo at 25yds. Even when you are careful, I guess strange things can happen. I still feel bad about that incident. I am thinking outdoor ranges may be better. Never had that happen outside.
Were you mag dumping as fast as your finger would go? That's more my concern here. I'm ok with a 15 inch spread WAY down range, but from ten yards because dude is just spraying and not concerned about what's down range is a problem for me.
 
When I was a kid at summer camp, we had a 50' NRA .22LR range. Wood 1x4 target frames that we tacked our targets to, in front of steel plates angled down at 45 degrees.

Every once in a while, we'd get splatter-back. Rounds would hit the plates and get forced straight down...into a pile of prior-shot bullets. Sometimes that pile of old lead would get hit just the wrong way, and pieces of lead would come back to the firing line. That was how we knew it was time to clean the range. After morning class, we'd head downrange with gardening trowels, dig out the old lead, and dispose of it (there was a 30-gal can in the range office that got emptied by a local company whenever it got full and we called them).

Wasn't the range's fault. Wasn't a design fault. Just a maintenance thing. My local range (now) has rubber pieces piled against the back wall - it looks like the world's biggest "my pillow" exploded, and dumped black foam all over that end of the range. There's a company who, on a schedule, vacuums out all of that stuff; separates the black foam rubber stuff from the projectiles; puts all the black foam rubber stuff back into the range, and recycles/disposes of the projectiles. If your bullet hits an old bullet just wrong (just right?)...it could certainly ricochet.
 
Were you mag dumping as fast as your finger would go? That's more my concern here. I'm ok with a 15 inch spread WAY down range, but from ten yards because dude is just spraying and not concerned about what's down range is a problem for me.

No. I was taking my time. It may have been a lack of range maintenance like Peglegjoe said. I didn't think of that. The range was really busy
 
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