Tracers? I can't comprehend how stupid one has to be to fire tracers, indoor or outdoor, wherever there is even the slightest risk of fire. Did this happen with the first shot, or did it take several of them bursting on the steel plates before it caught parts of the backstop on fire?
Did nobody on the range stop him, nobody in the control center? No fire extinguishers on site that were used to shut the fire down in a timely manner? How in the world did that chain of events happen and escalate to the point of burning down a building? It's not like a guy tossing a cigarette into the shred barrel in the back of a solvent manufacturing firm.
No, that range will not be back. I doubt that anyone is insane enough to start it over, not in the same place at least. How much would insurance cost, what sort of hoops would he have to jump through? Will the city allow it, since shooting ranges are an obvious hazard to life and property? Will his insurance (assuming that he had coverage for the equipmnent) pay enough to start him over?
One blockhead broke rules, or if not that, was stupid enough to fire unidentified ammunition, and destroyed a thing that is becoming increasingly precious, and one by one, vanishing.
Do you know what else he destroyed?
MY REPUTATION!
from now on, there are people in that town who will believe that gun owners are idiots, that they can't even be controlled and use common sense in the most restricted possible circumstances. What would have happened if the ammo magazine hadn't been evacuated in time? A couple cases of ammo had been set out near the backstop? At least one idiot deserves to be called a complete idiot. In the wake of that event, a large percentage of people who hear about this will have all of the confirmation that they ever needed that guns are for idiots who burn down houses and kill people and can't be trusted to use them even with controlled supervision. Brady foundation, schumer, they will all be passing this around as evidence that the 'guy next door' is an idiot who might eventually burn down the entire subdivision.
I'm going to guess that the thing had a sawdust and tilted steel backstop, the tracer compound was driven into the sawdust and smoldered, the smoke wasn't noticed because of gunsmoke, and by the time it was actually seen, the fire may have already been burning out of control. Fine sawdust that was fluffed out and full of air. In fact, there was a possible dust explosion hazard, if enough dust was thrown into the air by the rest of the shooters before the fire started.
it begs the question, why wasn't there an appropriate sprinkler system in place, or other safety equipment? Is there a possibility that there could have been industrial smoke detectors that could discriminate between 'normal' levels of smoke as would be found in an industrial setting, and higher levels indicating a smoky fire?
This should be a learning experience, it's something that nobody should ignore, and people in this business at any level should be asking questions about preventing it. The one question that would just be a waste of time is 'what are we going to do about the idiots?' We just have to bite the bullet and try to keep the idiots reigned in.
