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I can tell you from first hand experience just how dangerous shooting can be for starting a fire! A few years ago, I was doing some praire dog busting in my lower fields, with a . And a .243, I didn't even know it was there, but there was a piece of old steal fence sticking out of the ground about a foot, I got it with the .22 from about 70 feet. And with in seconds I had a pretty good grass fire going! I grabbed up my stuff and ran for the dozer and got the wife to fire up the water truck and bring it Down! In less then 10 min time I had a full blown fire that burned about an acre before I managed to get it put out! The part that really surprised me was that a copper jacketed lead bullet could set off a spark and light off a fire! Normally my fields are not that dry, but we were going through dam renovations and expansion, so I wasn't irigating nearly as much, so the conditions were ripe for a fire!
Another time, I set a pretty good brush fire from the muzzle blast/flash from a .30/06 prone, that one I got out quick with a shovel, but it also showed how quick you can get a fire going in hot and dry conditions!
Thanks for the stories, good hearing from experiences.

Bullets hitting things get hot. Very hot. Hot enough to burn something, get the right something and you got fire.

I have one experience to share, and I learned dearly from it. Now, even in the pissing rain, I have a shovel, a bucket, and a 5 gallon BC fire extinguisher.

My whole fam was out once in NV on a hot very dry day. My dad was ringing steel out at I want to say 200 yards, didn't realize he mixed in a magazine of tracers in the lot. Proceeded to ring steel after reloading to a different mag, the one with tracers. After he was done we were sitting there for a bit and my younger brother in a calm demeanor states, "Did we start that fire?" I about lost my bubblegum. We were not well equipped, and learned from it. I sprinted uphill to the brush, by the time I got there two brushes were fully aflame. Kicked dirt into it like a mad man. Then my brother got there with a piece of wood, makeshift shovel, and proceeded to dump dirt onto it. My dad got there and the three of us kicked shoveled and poured water all over the two bushes until we were 110% certain they were out. Crazy part was we found the projectile, it was a miss, it was easy to locate as the mixture inside it was still burning bright red.

Since then we all go out better prepared, and I try to educate as many as I can.
 
Thank you! The more people educated about safety on public lands, the better.

I used to be clueless. I used to shoot on public lands. I thought I was being careful, cautious, and respectful, but in retrospect wasn't like I should have been. It was merely out of ignorance. It's great to see the message getting out more nowadays.

It's also great to see a positive relationship being developed with the forest service. It seems that more often you run into a negative, us vs. them attitude.

For example, some years ago I was in the hills out of Springfield, OR, with a friend, for some target practice. It was middle of summer and fire danger, but we had water and a shovel as I recall. We got up to where we normally went. It was the only place left where nobody was shooting, but there was a forest service truck parked there and a couple of guys just standing looking at the shooting area.

We stopped and politely tried to strike up a conversation. I asked if there was a fire or something. The response was a very short "No". I was as polite and friendly as I could be and asked sincerely if it would be OK for us to shoot there. The reply was a very rude "We can't stop you." It was a bizarre experience. They clearly hated us because we were there to shoot guns, and they made that very clear.

Hopefully in the future education and partnership will start to take the place of distrust and hostility.
 
Eastern WA (by Royal City), private land, middle of summer. Went to the second of two private shoots where "Butch" invited people he knew with interesting firearms/etc. (cannon and mortar were included).

Some of the .50 BMG shooters were shooting tracer in the evening, and started a fire on a hill about 1500 meters away. Took them 20 minutes to get there by the indirect road that went up onto the hill. Used a lot of water.

No more tracers were allowed after that and should have never been allowed in the first place - although it was fun to watch them, especially when they ricocheted up into the sky.

We were all thinking about the possible headlines in the newspapers about how some crazy guys with guns and cannon and mortars started a brush fire and burned thousands of acres. Fortunately they got it put out.
 
Sounds a bit more like someone was shooting Tracers. We used to shoot belts of nothing but Tracers over on the Yakima Firing Range just for the purpose of starting fires. We would fly in a circle and then watch the snakes coming out of their holes. When they began moving the Raptors would have a Field Day.
 
WA DNR FIRE CREW SNUFF OUT A SMOKING STUMP.

On Saturday, July 14, 2018, a 90 degree day, a DNR Fire crew responded to a report from a target shooter of smoke rising from a stump in the Yacolt Burn State Forest. The stump was being used as a backstop for target shooting. DNR Fire quickly responded and extinguished the smoldering embers before it ignited into flames.


Target shooting can and does start fires under certain conditions. Never use stumps, down logs, and trees as they are prime with dry tinder and can easily start a wildfire.

This particular stump has thousands of rounds inside, as it has been used as a backstop for years. Many of the rounds are of steel and copper core. The wood has been mulched down into soft fine shavings of fire starting tinder. As bullets collide with each other, you get sparks inside the stump that begin to smolder.


When steel and copper core bullets strike a hard surface, steel/rock/other bullets, a tremendous amount of friction is generated. Friction is heat. Super heated fragments, very tiny in size, fly off in various directions. They can land in dry tinder and smolder for quite some time. The heat associated with the bullet or bullet fragments can and has, as we witnessed today, created fire in stumps and logs.


Work in the field, such as flush cutting stumps and logs, have shown where the wood, in the stump, has been charred around the bullet or bullet fragment. You may be long gone when a fire actually ignites.

The shooter had noticed smoke rising from the stump and promptly notified fire officials. The shooter had also dug out part of the smoldering area of the stump to allow water to penetrate the burning area more quickly.

This is a reminder of the importance to ALWAYS TAKE FIRE PREVENTION GEAR with you at all times when shooting. (It's a requirement in the fire season, but responsible shooters pack it year round). And never use trees, logs or stumps as backstops! You need a 2 1/2 to 5 pound fire extinguisher, 1-2 gallons of water and a shovel, as minimum gear.


On hot days, it's best to shoot early in the morning or not shoot at all that day. Avoid using steel targets on hot days. Use lead bullets rather than copper or steel core types.

Being responsible is easy and it's an important part of preserving our privilege to shoot on public lands. If we destroy it, we loose it. Kind of simple. Do it right and Trash No Land!


More info on fire prevention in target shooting at: Fire Safety in Target Shooting

Thanks for posting. Another fantastic reason to switch from Sprint/t mobile to verizon. And upgrade my phone. Its expensive but my cell reception sucks b***s and needs upgrading. Its so bad i have serious doubts even the emergency signal boosting would work.
Pretty sure its partially my phone antenna as well.
 

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