Lead Contamination at Shooting Ranges

[Mrsig]

We shoot a lot of hand gun & long gun on my 200 meter range heck I even have my Jeep club & the Scouts on my range about 10 time a year.

The only thing I ask is for every one to pick up the cases. I have 3 jugs Brass, Steel & Aluminum for them.

The kids love to go to the back stop at the end and pick out the rounds they find.

 

[3Ts]

A neighbor has set up a pistol range with steel plates, followed by railroad ties, followed by more stuff (not sure what all is there). In front of the steel plates he hung the rubber horse mats from tractor supply. There's a small gap between the mats and the steel plates. He has a catch basin at the bottom to catch all the bullets. The steel plates stop the bullets, the mats allow the bullet to pass through, but stops the splatter. Seems to work well. (Pistols only, no rifles)

 

[HawkinsHollow]

A neighbor has set up a pistol range with steel plates, followed by railroad ties, followed by more stuff (not sure what all is there). In front of the steel plates he hung the rubber horse mats from tractor supply. There's a small gap between the mats and the steel plates. He has a catch basin at the bottom to catch all the bullets. The steel plates stop the bullets, the mats allow the bullet to pass through, but stops the splatter. Seems to work well. (Pistols only, no rifles)

I like this idea!!!

I was planning on making a railroad tie or dirt filled tire backstop. Putting a catch basin underneath doesn't sounds like a bad idea either. The mats too, brilliant. This will be a rifle and pistol range though.

Ultimately we might be talking about 1000-1500 rounds per year. So I am really not THAT worried. Just mostly curious about everyone's thoughts on it

 

[MossRoad]

Some interesting reading from the EPA on shooting ranges and lead, best practices, and such.

And before a bunch of you go off on the EPA...

Acknowledgements
The USEPA would like to acknowledge the support of:
• The National Rifle Association of America
• The National Shooting Sports Foundation
• The Wildlife Management Institute
• Mark Begley of the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection
• Mr. Dick Peddicord of Dick Peddicord and Company, Inc.
These participants provided valuable information and assistance as peer reviewers in the develop- ment of the manual and their efforts are truly appreciated. EPA also wishes to give special thanks to Dr. Charles W. Sever of Okie Environmental Consulting, L.L.C., Inc., Mr. Mike Warminsky of Brice Environmental Services Corp., and Mr. Victor Ordija of Sporting Goods Properties.The EPA also wishes to acknowledge and thank the many others who provided important comments and insight, and especially those individuals who took the time to meet with us in person or on the phone.

https://www.epa.gov/sites/default/files/documents/epa_bmp.pdf

I have a narrow 200 yard shooting alley on our property. I built a soft sand berm in a U shape behind the paper target area and shoot a few hundred rounds per year. I don't use metal targets because I think they cause ricochet out of the sand area. But that's just me.

When I was a kid, I used to shoot competitively indoors at two ranges. One was the YMCA, the other a city-owned parks department facility. There were two levels of steel backstops at 45 degree angles. The lower for prone position and the upper for standing. There were sand traps below each of them. These were 50' ranges.

I can tell you from personal experience, that even with the 45 degree angle steel plates, bullet fragments would come back and hit us occasionally. If you looked up at the acoustic tile ceiling over and behind the shooting stations, they were all torn up in the opposite direction. It was obviously from ricochet. And I'm not talking a few. There were thousands of tiny scratch marks in those ceilings at both ranges.

Eventually, the shooting sports waned in popularity at the Y and the city facility, probably due to the local gun stores with shooting ranges, and the lack of interest from youth.

I'm not sure what became of the area inside the Y. It's still there. The city facility was attached to a gymnasium and was open for decades. My kids took karate classes there for years. The shooting area was converted to a garage for parks department storage.

Only years later did they discover that not only the shooting range area, but the gymnasium and all side rooms were contaminated with lead dust. It was cleaned up, and the building sold.

Anyhow, I'd be pretty comfortable with a small shooting range with sand traps and adequate backstops and not worry too much about lead contamination as long as it's contained and not in a wet area.

 

[MossRoad]

When I was a kid in the late 60s/70s we used to play in this abandoned police shooting range. There was a dirt berm on 3 sides. There used to be cement sidewalks and shooting stations. And there were pits where I assume they launched clay pigeons from. I think it closed in the late 50s before I was born.

We used to pick brass from the grass, and we'd dig lead from the berms. A friend's father would take the lead and melt it down for fishing sinkers and wrist rocket ammo for us. He also made some boat anchors out of it.

A school was built to the bottom of the picture, and houses are now on the right, and apartments on the top. Public park on the left. Someone wanted to build more housing on it, until they found the lead contamination. So it sits 70 years after closing.

(click to enlarge)

 

[ddbackhoe]

However, you decide to build please make it larger than necessary. Sun angle during shooting hours becomes important too, shooting into the sun is likely to cause misses.

Building Your Own Backstop | Mississippi State University Extension Service

Sometimes it’s hard to find a safe and secure place to shoot. But you can make your own safe backstop without spending much money. Follow these steps and you’ll see that building your own backstop is as easy as 1, 2, 3!

extension.msstate.edu

https://nfa.ca/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/RCMP-ATI-Response-Range-Design-and-Construction-Guidelines-Jan-17-2014.pdf

 

[Jchonline]

This is a question for those of you that have shooting ranges on your property.

Do you worry about lead contamination?

Have you done anything to mitigate movement of lead into surrounding areas?

Would you be more concerned if this was an area that stay pretty wet and swampy over much of the year?

I am thinking about creating a couple 50-200 yard shooting lanes on my property so a couple buddies and I can shoot a couple hundred rounds every month or so. I am not talking about thousands of rounds every month or anything like that. Who has money to shoot that much?

Should I be concerned? What could I do to mitigate the spread of lead?

Thanks in advance for your insight!

Second on the remediation efforts. At the range in town they payed hundreds of thousands of dollars for remediation on 6 ranges. As mentioned, remove the top 6 ft of soil all around the target area and dispose of it in a hazardous dump. Big machines, big money.

That said there were tens of thousands of rounds a day being shot there...and they do remediation every decade or so.

I would not worry too much about a few hundred rounds a month personally unless that is close to a well (few hundred feet). If you can use lead free great.

What you could do is strip the top 1 foot every year and dispose of it....that would probably keep the overall contamination low.

 

[Jchonline]

A neighbor has set up a pistol range with steel plates, followed by railroad ties, followed by more stuff (not sure what all is there). In front of the steel plates he hung the rubber horse mats from tractor supply. There's a small gap between the mats and the steel plates. He has a catch basin at the bottom to catch all the bullets. The steel plates stop the bullets, the mats allow the bullet to pass through, but stops the splatter. Seems to work well. (Pistols only, no rifles)

I like that idea, may try it. So did he cut the rubber mats in the shapes of the steel plates?

 

[bigtiller]

I have swinging steel targets.
This was a .45 colt RNFP (round nose flat point)

 

[sea2summit]

Tiller, you forgot about the other end of the cool mushroom.