The much awaited Range Safety Officer course was held Saturday, April 26 at the range in St. Antoine from 8:00am to about 4:00pm. The presentor was our colleague and authority in the field, Wayde Clifford. Sixteen eager students absorbed Wayde's very informative and at times, entertaining presentation.
Wayde covered the functions of the Chief Range Safety Officer of training the RSOs and of developing Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) for the range. The content of the SOPs are determined by the range owners and typically include organizational information, range capabilities, range operations, shooting range rules and regulations and emergency response plan considerations.
He also covered the functions of the Range Safety Officer which include:
1. Planning and the conduct of the firing exercise
2. Issuing and detailing local instructions
3. Ensuring all personel are made aware of all safety regulations through a range safety briefing.
4. Giving orders to cease and commence firing
5. Ensuring that communications are maintained
6. Close control and supervision of personel and firearms
7. Ensuring that the range facility is left in good order
Wayde further talked about the functions of others during a firing excercise with emphasis on assistant RSOs. sentries and first aid officer. A good deal of time was taken with Range Rules stressing rules for safe behaviour. Unintentional discharges , or the conditions that may lead to one, can happen to anyone and it takes the shooter, his scoring partner as well as the RSO to attempt to prevent this. Emphasis was also placed on the Pre-shoot Briefing.
Everyone was involved in creating a Range Briefing which was then shared with the group for input. Additionally, everyone was able to practice the commands of the RSO at the firing line.
We also wrote a test based on Wayde's information - it was surprising to us older fellows how much information we were able to forget from the brief time it was presented to writng the test!
Many thanks to Wayde. We now have a good complement of qualified Range Safety Officers to run our matches.
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