Timer malfunction?

[Gary Johnson]

Had an interesting situation last Sunday. A shooter fired a course and when he heard his time insisted that it was impossibly long.

Here's the particulars:

The target array was set in three groups that were engaged from three seperate ports.

The timer indicated 17 shots in four groups. I don't remember the exact counts but the pattern was multiple shots, a couple second gap, several more shots, an other gap, several more shots, a five second gap and then one final shot.

The stage was all paper. Inspection of the targets showed 16 hits.

I was able to observe the shooter very closely. His last group of shots was very fast. The gap between his last and next to last was, at most, 0.5 seconds.

The RO did not shield the timer during 'unload and show clear'.

My theory:

The straggler was caused by mechanical noise emanating from the shooters weapon during clearing.

My boggle:

The shooter was asked if he wanted to use the 16th recorded shot as his official time. He declined and insisted on a re-shoot.

What would you have done?

[Tman33_99]

Since the concensus is the time is not resonable. Then a re-shoot should be ordered under rule 9.10 (both 14th editon and 2004).

9.10 Only the timing devise operated by the Range Officer shall be used to record the elapsed time of the competitors. If a timing device proves to be faulty, a competitor whose attempt cannot be credited with an accurate time will be required to re-shoot the stage.

[Vince Pinto]

Gary,

Before I comment, please advise the minimum number of rounds required to complete the course of fire (e.g. was it 16 or 17 or ??)