Shooting range death prompts calls for staff to be trained to spot mental health problems
A tragedy at a shooting range has triggered calls for a review into whether staff should be trained to spot mental health problems
By Steve Bird 20 February 2021 • 5:00pm
A coroner has called for shooting range staff to be trained in mental health after a suicidal man turned a weapon on himself during a tour of a site.
Michael Woods had visited the Tunnel Target Sports Centre in Charmouth, Dorset, claiming he was arranging a day out for work colleagues.
At the end of the tour Mr Woods, 40, from Somerset, asked for a “shooting experience” and was given a safety briefing before being granted a one hour session on a 25-metre range under the supervision of a qualified instructor and another person.
However, at the end he turned the gun on himself without any warning. He was airlifted to Southampton Hospital with gunshot wounds to the head. He died the following in October 2019.
Brendan Allen, a Dorset coroner, has written to the National Rifle Association and National Small Bore Rifle Association after hearing evidence that they consider ensuring range staff receive “training in identifying signs of abnormal behaviour on the part of anyone wishing to take part in a shooting experience”.
The coroner’s fear of future deaths report says the Dorset range had adopted a series of measures to prevent a similar tragedy happening again.
“The shooting range will no longer take bookings from the non-club members to shoot on the day they make the inquiry” to allow a “cooling off” period. Emergency response exercises are also held to improve how staff can respond to such an incident.
The coroner recorded death by suicide. He concluded: “In my opinion action should be taken to prevent future deaths and I believe your organisations [the rifle associations] have the power to take such action.”
A spokesman for the rifle associations said they will respond to the coroner in the coming weeks.
Not so sure that training the staff will make any difference, although I am all for the training to take place.
Short of chaining firearms to the bench this is an unworkable solution to a very very very small problem.
If someone intends to top themselves they will. No amount of training will prevent this rare occurrence.
Suicidal people are very good at hiding their feelings - they've probably been doing it for years.
"I don't like my job and I don't think I'm gonna go anymore."
How can you train lay members of the public in such a complex area of mental health.
Simply giving them a list of "things to look out for" is a pointless box ticking exercise.
There is also the issue of liability falling on the (un) trained (non) expert club member for not spotting something and being held to account post incident.
I'll be up for this, just after the multi-story car park attendant 'no car but he's going to the top floor' training or the one for supermarket check-out assistant 'spot the person buying vodka and paracetamol' training, or the one for the B&Q 'buying rope but looks a bit down' training.....
Several of the ranges I've used abroad have a 'no single people' policy, as a method of helping to prevent this.
I generally have to negotiate with them, as my wife has no interest in shooting herself, but have found in most (but not all) cases a combination of my FAC and there being youtube videos of me shooting allow me to get in.
I have lost pretty much all the respect I ever had for coroners, because of the ridiculous recommendations they make. It is clear that they have no understanding of half the subjects upon which they are commenting. Like it is easy to train a layman to spot these kind of subtle psychological clues. Even trained psychologists and psychiatrists often miss the clues. If it were that easy we could all be trained and suicide wiped out as a cause of death. Yeah, right.
Here every time there is a quad-bike accident that takes a life, coroners keep recommending full roll cages and seatbelts for quad bikes on farms, which would render them useless for half of their functions. If you are going to encumber quad bikes with that stuff, farmers might as well just drive pickups. The whole point of a quad if that it is quick, you can hop onto and off them quickly, you can get into smaller places with them, and of course roll cages and seatbelts would completely negate those advantages. Farmers would spend half their time in the field strapping themselves into and escaping the quad.
I do not know what ranges are like in the UK, but here with very few exceptions ranges are staffed entirely by volunteers who freely give up their time so shooters can enjoy their sport. The harder and more complicated you make it, the fewer volunteers you get, and eventually the range closes down. Now to be fair, that particular range sounded like a professional paid organisation, but I am guessing that any such law would not differentiate and ranges would go out of business. Which may be the underlying reason behind the recommendation.
We joined the NRA after attending an open day at Bisley back in 2007.
We got to shoot a selection of rifles...in each case, we were 1 to 1 with an instructor, and he wouldn't allow us to touch the ammunition.
We worked the bolt and he popped the cartridge in when he was satisfied that we were on aim and ready.
He was within arms length of us the whole time, so I wouldn't be surprised if they'd discussed the possible suicide scenario beforehand.
Apart from taking these common-sense precautions, I can't really see what other "training" is necessary.
Pete
"Tantum religio potuit suadere malorum" Lucretius
You're offended? Please explain why your inability to control your emotions translates into me having to censor my opinions....
Not in todays nice sanitised, huggy fluffy, tree hugging, eco compliant, total risk averse utopian liberal society that a minority of people are striving to make us all live in.......
