This thread makes me so glad I'm fortunate enough have local ranges where I can practice in my own outdoor bay. Unfortunately even that isn't always enough... Here are four examples of "curious things seen at the range".
1. Brass rat
I was practicing at my home range, in one of the outdoor bays. The bay is ~50’ long and 30’ wide. I had set up 3 USPSA metric targets and was working on shooting into and out of position at 15 yds. I guess I was really in the zone, because my situational awareness was disturbingly low. I didn’t realize anyone was in the bay with me until I heard something behind me. I looked back--there was a guy crouching down right behind me! I backed up and yelled “What the FUCK are you doing???” It was a truly ancient dude picking up my brass and putting it into a sack. He said, “Oh, do you want your brass?” Before I sent him on his way, I made him pour out the contents of the bag, which he argued about because he claimed the brass hadn’t all come from my gun. Note to self: check your 6 more often.
2. Gangbanger’s girlfriend
When I visit a buddy in California, there isn’t a lot of options for shooting. A convenient, but sketchy location is an indoor facility called Targetmasters West. In the evening, especially on weekends, the clientele is typically wannabe gangbangers and their chicks. One time, in the lane next to me and my buddy, a guy was there with a girl in 4” heels and super-tight jeans. He had given her a big .40 Beretta, and was standing behind looking at her ass. The girl had obviously never shot a gun before, and was very nervous. Just as I was about to intervene, she closed her eyes and fired. Then she danced and squealed “I shot it! I shot it!”, and turned--sweeping me and my buddy--and stopped with her finger on the trigger and the gun pointed straight at her guy. I couldn’t help thinking, “please… pull the trigger.”
3. Is it loaded?
This next incident was the last time I’ve been to Targetmasters because it’s just too scary. In two lanes to my left was a large group of older Chinese guys. One guy went to the back of the bays and took a Glock 26 out of a bag (obviously violating safety rules). Since he was pointing the gun in our direction (with finger in the trigger guard), I walked over and calmly put my hand on top of the slide and pointed it downrange. I asked him if the gun was loaded, but his English wasn’t very good. He didn’t like me grabbing his gun, and for some reason, he kept trying to point the gun at me. We ended up having a little grappling match while he was yelling at me in Chinese and his friends were trying to get in on the action. We ended with his gun pinned to the bench. After he finally let go, I discovered that gun was loaded and chambered. We left and informed the ROs (who never seem to pay attention to what’s going on in the bays).
4. I shot the roof
Another story from a different indoor range: Cletus and Billybob were in a lane to my left. They had one of those monster S&W revolvers for killing bears or Godzilla. It was so loud that I gave up trying to shoot and just watched them. After a couple of shots, Cletus was so twitchy that he was visibly shaking. He touched one off prematurely, and a ton of ceiling tile and dust rained down.
Cletus: “FUCK! I shot the roof…”
Billybob: “You idjut. They charge you like $20 every time you do that”
Cletus, looking up at the hundreds of holes in the ceiling: “Huh. They sure must make a lot of money that way.”