Bullets escape San Diego Indoor Range

Perhaps we're overreacting, but the idea of bullets flying through the wall of the San Diego Indoor Range earlier this month disturbed us. After all, someone could have gotten hurt. As it was, only a camper shell parked on Upas Street was hit, breaking the windows. But what if we had been walking by. or anyone else, for that matter?

We’ve often wondered about that hulking white building on India Street with a gun painted on the side. Once we went inside (ostensibly to learn how to shoot a rifle), where we stood next to some very scary people shooting some very loud guns at targets shaped like our very own head and torso. But this was the extent of our fears. Now we have to worry about being outside the place. The question on our mind was, “Can this happen again?”

First we had to find out what really occurred on September 3. So we asked Sonja Stevens, who lives across the street. She was the one who reported it to the police. When Stevens left her apartment that Thursday afternoon, she noticed a small hole in the tall cinderblock wall of the gun range, which was once a racquetball club. “I thought, ‘No, it couldn’t be,’ ” recalls Stevens. Later in the day, when she and her boyfriend returned home to Upas Street, they spotted two holes in the range’s wall “the size of large melons,” she says, referring to the casaba variety. “We could see bullets hitting the dirt on [our] side of the street,” says Stevens. Her boyfriend also noticed that the windows of his parked camper had been shattered.

They notified the gun range, which was closed immediately. Around eight o’clock that evening, Stevens thought to call the police, who came out and took a report. By midnight the holes were being patched by some workers. Two days later, on Saturday, the range opened again, according to Stevens.

The whole episode was over — until we found out about it, of course.

The San Diego Indoor Range would apparently like to forget the incident. This would explain why they haven’t responded to our polite and earnest telephone messages. But we did get some information from the San Diego Police Department. Public affairs officer Rick Carlson, who visited the range the day after the mishap, explained to us (several times, as we are sometimes dense) how the bullets got through the wall.

Why did the bolts fail? When did the baffling fall? How many bullets exited the wall? We could not get answers to these questions.

Now we will attempt to explain it ourselves. Please keep in mind that we are not ballistics experts.

Bullets fired down the individual ranges (which resemble bowling alleys with walls) go through the cardboard targets and hit a thick metal plate that is slanted toward the back of the building. The bullets are deflected up into a second metal plate, this one in a U shape. The second plate deflects the bullets down into a third metal plate. By now the bullets are tired, and they fall into a catch pan. The whole setup is called a baffling system (hence our confusion), and each metal plate is called a baffle.

Baffle number three, which hangs in front of the building’s wall, fell down. The bolts that held it in place gave up. The bullets went from the U-shaped baffle to the back wall, which is made of gray cinderblocks. Eventually, the bullets chipped their way through.

Why did the bolts fail? When did the baffling fall? How many bullets exited the wall? We could not get answers to these questions. The job of the police department, according to officer Carlson, was to find out if any crimes were committed. None were.

Well. We pursued this matter by calling all sorts of public agencies, some having high-caliber-sounding names. They said things like “We only seize weapons” (Federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms); “We license people with machine guns” (weapons control unit of the Department of Justice); and “Wow. That’s amazing” (city building inspection).

The city building department, which has a code enforcer for this sort of thing, heard about the bullets from us last Thursday. After checking with the big cheeses for the Official Building Department Reaction to the news, a supervisor said, “We’re looking at procedures to prevent similar occurrences.” The gun range, which had to pass safety codes before it opened last year, is not regularly inspected by the city, he said. The building department is considering sanctions against the business, he added.

This is not what we wanted. We’re sure the gun range operators are sorry and that they've learned an important safety lesson. We even agree with the neighbor, Sonja Stevens, who said, “I don’t like the look of the clientele, but it’s better that they come here than go out in the country and shoot cows.” We think it would be a nice gesture, however, if the owners of the gun range would pay for new windows on her boyfriend’s camper.