My experience is singular. It was at the first (and only?) gun show in Frisco, Texas in late 2005 or early 2006. It was about 15-20 minutes after the doors opened and my buddy and I were rounding our 2nd or 3rd isle when the shot occurred. It came from across the room from our location, but I could see the area of the shot's origination, although I did not know the exact location until later. I had no idea what had been discharged, who discharged it, if anyone was hurt. There was a small grey cloud that could be seen briefly in the lights immediately above the shot area.
At this point, let me say that I always expected that with all the cheap talk about situational awareness, reaction times, etc., that with the gun shot in a gun show, there would have been several people to react quickly. I would guess there was maybe 150 people in the show at the time other than sellers. I was markedly shocked and sickened by the lack of response, including my own.
After the shot occurred, 2 things happened. First, everyone got quiet and the room became very quiet. Second, everyone stopped moving. A few of us, including myself, went as far as to duck down, hunching over a bit, but not actually doing any serious avoidance like actually hitting the dirt. Nobody took flight. I didn't see anyone between me and the sound of the shot turning around to check their 6 or to see if the shot was just part of some bigger event, such as a distraction noise. I know they weren't looking behind them because I was doing the same darned thing and could see they were not!
After approximately 6-8 seconds, several doors came open and security from the event flowed in, about 8 guys (some of which may have been organizers and such, but several with SECURITY shirts) from several doors and converged on the shooting location. With no shouts or screams, everyone went back to his or her business without much concern. I was stupified by our reactions or lack thereof.
Come to find out, it was an ND into the floor by a guy about to do some work on a gun. It was not cleared properly and given it was a Glock, he had to pull the trigger to disassemble it. Fortunately, he didn't violate all the gun handling rules and nobody was hurt by the errant round itself, although several closeby vendors noting their ears were still ringing some 30 minutes later when we finally got around to that side of the show. By that time, the cops were there, patiently waiting to escort him from the building after he loaded up all his gear. There was a nice hole in the carpeting.
It was my first such event at a gun show. For my buddy, it was his second. One of the vendors we know said it was his 7th in 4 or 5 years.
What did I learn? Apparently unless there are many shots, blood flying, or somebody yelling something about jihad or DIE DIE DIE, a singular gun shot in an enclosed room of gun people is not apparently much cause for alarm. We would much rather stand around and wait to see how everybody else reacts instead of being prudent and moving away from the area of danger until we otherwise know if the danger is singular (and ND, suicide, etc.) or just the first shot of a bigger event (crazy person, mass murder, etc.). No, until which time a grander threat than a singular gun shot manifests itself, we will simply stand around like livestock. No doubt if the threat is grander, will will take flight like livestock in an uncontrolled herd mentality.
The show was held in the convention area of the Embassy Suites as I recall. It was a separate building from the hotel. As a convention room, it is made to be sectioned off into many smaller convention rooms. Each of those rooms will have doors which means the overall bigger single room has many doors. It was with the entry of the security folks that I realized just how many available exits there were. By the time they started to enter, I was calculating my way to the nearest exit I had passed. The problem was, once I realized the structure of the building's convention room, the "nearest" exit I passed would actually put me going past 3 additional exits on the way to it. In all, there were probably 6 or 7 exits that were closer (without going over vendor tables) physically closer to me than the exit I had last noticed and thought was closest. Of those, at least 5 were in a direction AWAY from the perceived danger. The last or nearest exit I had seen was the exit for the BALLROOM and was one of several, but there were several smaller exit signs over doors that were the regular meeting room doors when the ballroom was partitioned. I had pretty much failed to identify any of them. As near as I could tell, save for security, nobody else had either, or if they had, made no move to use them.
While chatting during the show with another customer, I commented on the lack of response. He said something like, "What are you going to do, out run a bullet?" Of course not. For a singular bullet, there really isn't much one can do, but none of us knew if it was a singular bullet shot and that the event was over or if it was just the first shot of a bigger event. We all reacted pretty much like there was no danger and that there would be no second gun shot.
For the vast majority of the folks there who did not see the event occur and could not actually see and identify the guy who discharged the gun, all of us should have been working to distance ourselves from the danger. We failed miserably in this regard. I understand that how things went down with this event is not unusual in gun shows.
I now look for as many exits as I can find, not just the ones with the biggest signs. I hope to not again react like docile livestock should such a thing happen again. It was not prudent.