You know, just like I'm told sometime, Ken.........."curiosity killed the cat". IOW, I really don't know why we did. I told the clerk and my wife agreed that I should. Now, if I would've left the range and went to the sales desk, but they were busy, that would have been time out of the time we bought to shoot. We've had this same jam happen to us at an outdoor range and, with a small screwdriver, got the bullet out and continued shooting. To us, it's a silly rule and I'm fairly sure that other shooters in the range feel the same way. When a shooter can unjam their own gun, why call someone to do it for them? Prying a bullet out of a handgun isn't dangerous at all and, I'll bet, thousands of shooter have done this either on an indoor range or outdoor range.
So….maybe the people you reported thought eye protection was silly. Personally, I think the rule about not pointing an unloaded weapon at another person is silly because after all, it’s unloaded and I know exactly what I’m doing. Hmmm….maybe because a few people like to make their own rules is why I don’t go to gun ranges. I have been to a few across the United States and after a couple of bad experiences, I just do not trust a lot of folks to have the good sense it takes to handle a weapon.
Then, the question would be.........just where would a person go to shoot targets? Actually, concerning different things, people like making their own rules. We've seen that from residents right here in our apartment complex. I've seen that in the employment world and even see some of that "making their own rules" in the Navy. Of course, in any military service, military members don't get away with that nearly as much as civilians do. Like the outdoor gun/rifle range we were members of in Jacksonville, Florida for 10 years, the Range Officers couldn't be everywhere all of the time.
And, when there are range officer/officers, especially at outdoor ranges, they can't be everywhere all of the time. IOW, range officer drives by a certain range, the officer tells the person that have to do something, like put on safety glasses. The person puts them on, and then, as soon as the officer leaves, the person takes the glasses off. By luck, if the officer is seen coming, the person will put the glasses back on. This does happen.
I would have thought eye protection was a silly rule. While I wear hearing protection sometimes, I don't generally wear eye protection when I shoot. I know how you feel about the rule about clearing jams, however. I once worked as a drill press operator and I was supposed to call someone else if I broke a drill bit. Standing there for ten minutes waiting for someone to change my drill bit didn't make any sense when I could change it out myself in less than one, but that was a union rule that I broke regularly. If you don't mind driving to St. Agatha, Maine, and then walking a couple of miles through the snow, I'll let you shoot on my land. The only rule would be to do your best to avoid killing anyone. But if you did, they were probably trespassing anyhow.
Well, under the same topic/thread, we are now looking at Magazine Speed Loaders. They are on Amazon and there are ones for our S & W 9mm SD9VE, Sig Sauer Mosquito .22 and our Henry Lever-Action .22 Rifle. Loading a 9mm magazine takes some thumb power and, after a few are loaded, it gets tougher and tougher to get the next one in. The old thumb starts hurting. Loading the Mosquito isn't really hard, but gets that way after a few are loaded. Actually, until researched, neither of us had ever heard of Magazine Speed Loaders. I remember one time, I was putting a 30-30 bullet into the side of the Winchester Lever-Action we use to have. My thumb was cut doing it!
Hubby got me a revolver. 9 shots. less likely to hurt myself and less likely to jam, is what he said. I like it but mostly use it and my rifle on critters bent on hurting my chickens, not so much on neighbors who annoy me.
My daughter in Atlanta area goes to indoor range but we prefer the outdoors one. There is always an instructor at the one she visits. Down here there's a 3-year waiting list to join the gun club with a range. Or was last time we checked which was about 5 years ago.
A range officer won't be at every station all the time, but should be there to answer questions and address rule and safety violations. It has been a while since I have gone to a range, but the closest real outdoor range had at least one officer at every station--sporting clays, skeet, trap, pistols and handguns, small bore rifles, large bore rifles, etc. Archery was in a different section.
Our favorite outdoor range is only $25 a year membership. We went a couple of times and no one was shooting. I asked my friend why. She said that mostly guys went there to drink which was OK if they told their wives they were going to the range with the guys. There is a nice bar there.
Got the Red Dot Sight put on our S&W 9mm yesterday at Sportsmans Warehouse. At first, the clerk told us that the one we bought wouldn't fit on our 9mm. I told him that on the website it said it would fit ours. The thing was, the rear sight had to be removed from ours to get the new Red Dot Sight put on. After some inspection, he said he'd try to get our sight off. He got it off and installed the Red Dot one. Was going to charge us $15 for the install, but didn't charge us anything. Why? He said, "it's Christmas" and "I was in the Air Force for 27 years and you were in the Navy". I had told him about my Service in the Navy during Vietnam. He honored me being in the Navy. We thanked him a number of times, of which he was very appreciative of. While there, bought a little more ammo and another 9mm magazine. Have three different Fast Reloaders coming in from Amazon next week. Our thumbs will no longer get sore pushing 9mm and .22 ammo into magazines! And then, it happened again. We were at a farm/ranch supply store, after the Red Dot Sight install, and I mentioned to a few ladies that were shopping there that my wife owns and shoots a S&W 9mm. They were both happy and shocked. Guess there isn't that many women out there, my wife's age, that shoot...........or, at least what we've seen.