Posted on 08/26/2014 6:50:05 PM PDT by Rennes Templar
A shooting range instructor in Arizona was accidentally shot and killed by a 9-year-old girl who was learning how to shoot an Uzi, authorities said on Tuesday.
Charles Vacca, 39, was teaching the girl how to use the automatic weapon on Monday morning at the Last Stop outdoor shooting range in White Hills, Arizona, when she pulled the trigger and the kickback caused the gun to lurch over her head, investigators said.
Vacca was hit by a stray bullet and airlifted to University Medical Center in Las Vegas, where he was pronounced dead late Monday. The girl was at the range with her parents at the time, but their names were not released.
Sam Scarmardo, the manager for the Last Stop's shooting range, told NBC News that "the establish practice at most shooting ranges is 8 years old and up with parental supervision."
He said Vacca was a "great guy, with a great sense of humor" and called him "very conscientious and very professional."
Scarmardo said that the range has never had a similar incident in over a decade of being open — "not even a scratch."
"I just ask everybody to pray for Charlie, and pray for the client, she’s going to have a hard time," said Scarmardo.
The Arizona Department of Public Safety referred inquiries to the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms, which didn't return calls for comment.
Ronald Scott, a Phoenix-based firearms safety expert, said most instructors usually have their hands on guns when children are firing high-powered weapons. "You can't give a 9-year-old an Uzi and expect her to control it," Scott told the Associated Press.
(Excerpt) Read more at nbcnews.com ...
We live in times where all kinds of nasty brutal s**t happens all the time...Yet so many don’t seem to have a clue....
Don’t these people keep up on current events? This has happened before. Does the range owner live under a rock? No 9 year old girl or boy should be discharging a fully automatic firearm.
Not the only. very rare, yes, but it does happen.
A kid (6yo?) shot himself with a micro Uzi some years back at Knob Creek. Thing just spun around.
Lesson: don’t give people more firepower than they can obviously handle.
It happened last November at a range in Missouri when a girl was given a .500 caliber revolver to shoot and the recoil caused the gun to spin around in her hand and a second shot occurred after that killing her. I saw this story on a youtube video called “range jerks” just last night. Just like there are jerks on the road, they can be found in gun ranges too.
I agree. A fully automatic SMG is way too much gun for the average 9 year old to handle safely. That’s especially true when it’s likely the kid’s first time handling any firearm (i.e. knows little to nothing about recoil, etc.).
9? 9 was BB gun age in saner times ... maybe .22 starting around then if proficiency had been proven with the BB gun.
“No 9 year old girl or boy should be discharging a fully automatic firearm.”
That’s what everyone is saying here. To give give the instructor the bennfit of the doubt, he may have had some other stronger children shooting well without his assistance, and became complacent thinking this one could also.
Never heard of suicides at the gun range? There was the mother son duo..i think there was one in Vegas.
Also forgot about Chris Kyle.
My 12-year-old Grandson learned to shoot a 22 at Boy Scout Camp, just recently! They let him go because he recently turned 12 at his last birthday. He earned a number of badges too, a badge for marksmanship was one of them. The irony is, he didn’t hurt himself at that, or any other activity, but fell off a log and broke his wrist! He had to go to a local hospital to have it set, but wanted to go back to camp afterward. He said he had a lot of fun during the week, he also said he was having fun while he was hurt (well up until that time, that part wasn’t fun, and the accident happened at last day before they went home)he wanted to be with the other kids, that’s my boy!
There was a very similar case in Western Massachusetts a few years ago where an 8 year old (under his father’s supervision) triggered an Uzi and the muzzle rise was so fast that he shot himself in the head.
There are some weapons that shouldn’t be used by children
>> gun ranges are quite possibly the safest places on the planet.
Except for the suicides: The Aurora Gun Range in Colorado had a pair of Australian sisters that offed themselves in stereo about 3-4 years ago. A fellow instructor was there for that one, and another a year or two before that.
Shoot Straight in Apopka, Florida (NW of Orlando) had a suicide last year.
or maybe I should say by those who are physically incapable of controlling the weapon during recoil
I think he thought it would be a treat for the young lady and never contemplated her ability to control the weapon. I feel bad for the girl, she is going to have a lot of issues with this.
Mother / son
http://www.nbcnews.com/id/30109090/ns/us_news-crime_and_courts/t/mom-kills-son-then-self-shooting-range/#.U_1RkGRdWHc
Another suicide:
http://www.tampabay.com/news/publicsafety/pinellas-park-police-investigate-suicide-at-gun-range/2154047
Which would be most 9 yr-olds.
agreed.... and some more petite females
I am a firm believer that the APPROPRIATE weapon is the first step in training
Yes, he appeared to relish instructing her.
One could think that to instruct a 9 yr-old to operate a Uzi is just...instant bad karma?
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