Project Appleseed

Shooters!  Center Up!

Our second consecutive soldout shoot at Patriot Academy started off with a cold, misty rain - but, Riflemen persist!

During this event, we had not one... but two squibs!  Our very first Redcoat target of the weekend produced a raised hand by thirteen-year-old Andrew Vargas, summoning an instructor to assist.  By paying close attention during the safety briefing, Andrew demonstrated a textbook response to a trigger squeeze and a 'click' followed by a muffled and weak 'bang".  After inspection, the instructor discovered that we had a .22 LR slug lodged in the bore of Andrew's 10/22.  A squib!

Shortly thereafter, during one of our sighter square targets, Alexi raised his hand after hearing his muffled bang and I came over to investigate.  I ran a cleaning rod through the muzzle of his Ruger 10/22 and about halfway down the cleaning rod came to a stop.  A little more pressure began to dislodge and push a .22 LR slug back out towards the chamber.  Another squib!

In both cases, extracting the slug from the bore produced unspent powder.  The consensus was the rain was a likely culprit.

As the day wore on, shoot mats became soaked which, in turn, led to soak pants for most of our participants.  We shut things down a little early, saving our first AQT for day two.

On day two, Marshall gave a great rendition of the Second Strike of the match and Mike completed the hat trick by telling the story of the militia's response to Lexington and Concord on Battle Road as the Redcoats made their way back to Boston.  The weather began to improve after lunch and we ended up getting five AQTs in for the weekend.

Based on the weekend's results, I am proud to welcome several new Rifleman into the club: Bruce, Steve, Caleb and Walter.  I'd like to extend a special shout out to Steve who has persisted through several 25M events, coming close but never quite hitting 210/250.  On Sunday, he blew past 210 earning his first Rifleman patch!  Mark, a local Red Hat and frequent contributor to our instructor core, requalified as a Distinguished Rifleman and earned the newest version of the patch.  Randy, after many attempts, finally put it all together and EARNED a perfect score of 250/250!  The dedication, investment it time and gear in combination with a lot of natural talent helped Randy earn his "250" patch.  Congratulations, gentlemen!

"Those who expect to reap the blessing of freedom must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it."  - Thomas Paine


Sincerely,

Peter Benshetler "Malibu"
Shoot Boss

Looks great!
Nice variety of rifles there. Imma half to get me one of them A1s when I grow up.

Nice!  Two squibbs -- that's crazy!  Were they using the same ammo -- from the same lot???  I have only seen two squibbs in the past 10 years.

Hey Kim,

The two squibs were from two different rifles using completely different ammo makes.  Totally bizarre to see, but wonderful the students caught it!!!  It was great because all of the other students got to see a squib is a real possibility and not a mythical condition.

Chad Stovell - GenX Minuteman