Level II,shooting stopped because of rain

[Nik Habicht]

2.3.6 If the Range Master (in consultation with the Match Director) deems

that climatic or other conditions have, or are likely to, seriously affect

the safety and/or conduct of a match, he may order that all shooting

activities be suspended, until he issues a resume shooting directive.

The resume shooting directive could only be given the following day.

2.3.4 pertains to making changes to a course of fire.

or if the stage has been rendered unsuitable or unworkable for any reason,

Weather conditions that affect the safety of the stage and make it unsafe would apply in this instance.

Also, as I said, offering the shooter the option to come back is NOT an answer. You offered them the option to shoot the match in 1 day, If you weren't going to honor that, you shouldn't have offered it, Shooters cannot be held responsible for acts of God, or your shortsightedness as a MD.

Totally wrong call, IMO. The stage should have been thrown out.

You've given us your opinion a couple of times -- can you back it up with a rule?

(Full disclosure: I -- and a number of others, including JJ Racaza -- was once unable to finish a sectional due to darkness setting in; the match staff offered me the opportunity to complete the match the next day, and my car's engine simply stopped 3/4 of the way to the range the next day. I never completed the stage, and the stages that had a backup on Saturday were not tossed from the match. And that delay was largely due to ambitious, and incorrect planning.)

[Woodsk]

I shot the morning session so I was not effected. but hearing about the conditions and seeing the pictures from those there were there in the afternoon it sounds like the right call to me. I know one shooter that made a 10 hour round trip to come back the next day and shoot one stage.

Edited May 20, 2015 by Woodsk

[EEH]

For me if it was that bad,and I was in contention for top prize,I would be glad to come back the next morning.

I think anyone and everyone can shoot better when you can move and see all targets,not have to worry about falling down..

No I didn't shoot the match,but if it was raining that hard I would have taken my old ass home or to the motel,come back the next day or say better luck next time..

Sounds like those involved made the Right call!,

[2MoreChains]

Tossing a stage may be the answer if it is just one stage that was not able to be completed. But if the delays in the match resulted in multiple squads unable to finish multiple stages, whats a MD/RM to do? You can't toss all the incomplete stages, especially if it accounts for a significant number of stages in the match.

We play in an outdoor sport subject to the vagaries of outdoor conditions. Muddy conditions you can kind of mitigate by adding gravel. Wind you can try to anchor things down best you can. Rain you use bags. But lightning? There is no mitigation save hide, hunker, and wait it out.

[CHA-LEE]

I feel bad for the RM and MD in this situation. Poor weather forcing the stopping of shooting is never an easy thing to recover from even if you get to resume and finish the planned schedule on the same day.

Hosting a major match is hard enough when the schedule runs as it should much less when it gets screwed up. When an unplanned monkey wrench gets thrown into the schedule causing a significant alteration to the shooting schedule that is a significant issue to overcome.

When events that are out of our control negatively impact the match, all anyone can do is assess the situation and make the appropriate call on how to deal with it.

This is "Practical" shooting, and unforeseen weather issues is simply part of the "Practical" shooting challenge. Sure we would all like it if the weather was perfect and the schedule ran perfectly. But nobody can guarantee good weather for a major match. All they can do is plan the best they can and roll with the hand they are dealt.

If your schedule is too restrictive to "roll with" the defined solutions for dealing with the extraordinary crappy weather, how is that the fault of the match staff? Man up and deal with it, or gracefully bow out.

[bikerburgess]

Parallax3d,

I see that you are a CRO, so you are telling me you would have been happy to be on the stage that had a 60 foot tree fall on it, or the 10 inches of water, just so a few shooters could finish a match.

Lucky for my Staff and the shooters at the match you where not in charge, because someone might have been hurt.

You can have all the opinions you want, but you where not there and did not have 100 peoples safety to think about. So stop telling me that I was wrong or made a bad call. All the shooters where given the chance to finish, this was a three day match and just because they signed up for one of the three days NEVER guarantees them to finish in that one day, we play outdoors and sometimes the weather does not allow that to happen.

So rather then throw the whole match out as you are suggesting, 10 or so shooters got a DNF and life goes on.

I never said anything about trying to allow the people to shoot on an unsafe stage either! Stop putting words in my mouth!!

Yes, I AM a CRO, and I KNOW that you could have thrown out the STAGE, and that would have been MY call!

Who the HELL said anything abou throwing the whole match out?!! I said throw out the STAGE that was affected. It's done all of the time. They threw out a stage at Nationals last year because if a swinger that was not set up correctly, (stage 7 IIRC.) They couldn't reshoot everyone, so they threw out the STAGE.

1. The stage was deemed unsafe.

2. Everyone WAS NOT given an opportunity to reshoot it. You offered a 1 day format. You didn't honor it. The fact that it was a 3 day match is immaterial. Acts of God and range equipment malfunctions are NOT the shooter's responsibility.

Throwing out the ONE STAGE would not have ruined the entire match, and would have been fair to ALL competitors.

From what I have read it appears there was more than one stage involved. The OP was only affected on one but the other shooters were affected on others. So with that info do you still throw out all the stages where the shooters were Un able to come back and finish? Do you throw out all the stages and not give the option to finish the next day?

Edited May 21, 2015 by Nik Habicht
Quoted post edited to remove prime directive violation

[Corey]

The problem with throwing the stage out is that it wasn't one stage (from the sound of things- I wasn't there). Multiple stages needed to have people finish. You can't justify throwing out 4 or 5 stages of a match. Without being there and seeing it first hand, I would agree with the way things were handled.

[teros135]

Just about everyone here seems to think the RO and MD did the right things (or as right as they could get them, being human and dealing with unforseen force-of-nature stuff), given the situation they had to deal with. I also agree, and depending on the situation I might have found options for coming back the next day.

I don't see any evidence that the match administrators aren't qualified or capable. On the contrary, they seem to have given this situation a good deal of conscious thought and came up with a reasonable solution, given what they had to work with. They (and all their brethren and sistren) deserve our appreciation for putting on the match.

(Disclosure - I wasn't at this match but have shot/fought through rain-and-mud matches. Not as much fun as a sunny day, for sure...)

[Racinready300ex]

I don't think Parallax has read the entire thread. Maybe he should before deciding who is MD/RM material.

If you had read the hole thread you would know that it's not ONE STAGE. It was 10 shooters across FOUR STAGES out of nine total. If they tossed half the match I'm guessing they would of had 280 pissed of shooters.

The fact that a tree fell in one of the bays tells me that made the right call.

[rbebeau]

Agreed, the right call was made. Safety should always come first.

Now allow me to play devils advocate for a minute.

What if the inclement weather call had been made on the last day of shooting. The match ends and you have 20 people who are unable to finish. They don't have the option to finish tomorrow. Do you throw out however many stages are affected? What if the bad call happens on the morning of a two day match and only all-day Saturday squads finish? Do you throw out the entire match?

[motosapiens]

Agreed, the right call was made. Safety should always come first.

Now allow me to play devils advocate for a minute.

What if the inclement weather call had been made on the last day of shooting. The match ends and you have 20 people who are unable to finish. They don't have the option to finish tomorrow. Do you throw out however many stages are affected? What if the bad call happens on the morning of a two day match and only all-day Saturday squads finish? Do you throw out the entire match?

I guess I would call in sick to work and offer to run shooters on monday morning.

Mostly I would just try to build in a slightly looser schedule in the future to allow for thunder delays without running up against darkness.

[Nghthwk1911]

rbebeau,

good question, under rule 2.3.5, if the weather conditions call for stop, and it is the last day and no other opportunities for continued shooting where available it would be a real pickle.

I have run into this at a local match, and we got DNF's for all the shooters on the squads that had not finished, just the way it is.

I have not been exposed to this at the Nationals level or even the Area/Section level matches. I would guess that at some point in the past this has happened and would look to the RM/RMI core to point this out. Nik points out a section match that he a JJ were not able to finish for weather reasons, so it has happened.

As for building time into the schedule I think as MD's or RM's there is a little play, I know I left about 30min to an hour based on on-time shooting of the squads moving through the stages for each day.

Last squad should have finished at 6:30 pm on Sat for this match, and we where on time. I called a stop at 6:10, and shooting for the day at 7pm. with out cloud cover, sunset was not until 7:58 that day.

[MrDanCheck]

Kevin your my hero!

Adults have to make adult decisions everyday and not everyone will be happy.

I was there Saturday to register and shot Sunday morning and the the staff did a great job of cleaning up the mess from the storm.

I guess I should/could cry about the ground not being hard enough for my cleats, the mud slowed me down,the sun not lighting up my fiber optic and the fact I got a competitive advantage for not shooting in the 90 degree heat..

But I put on my big boy under wear today and I know you and Thor had a falling out.. So I won't complain.

[mikev49]

I don't get what all the complaining is about. All the prizes that any competitor shooting saturday afternoon had already been handed out. Its a registration prize match. Who cares if YOU CHOOSE to finish or not. You had the option to stay the night in the match hotel that would have only cost you $70 and shoot the next day but decided not to.

And for the record, I'd rather piss off 10 people who choose not to finish than piss off 280 who did finish.

[PKT1106]

One day shoot format and didn't "honor it"? I'm sure he'll put in a word with God or Gaia or whoever you think controls the weather to make sure this never happens again.

For sh*ts sakes, they had a natural disaster happen and got it cleaned up overnight, told the shooters affected they could finish the next day and your gripe is that they didn't honor the one day format? Call the papers because you got it all figured out.

I have never been a match director, but I am an engineer and was a project manager for 6 years. Sh*t happens. Get over yourself and move on. Sounds like they did the best they could do in the situation. Not everyone is going to be happy about the outcome of any project.

You had a chance to finish, that's all they could do. Either take it or go home. Until you're the one with the chainsaw cleaning up the tree, you got no call in this.

Bravo to the RM and MD for working together.

I know I may get a time out for this, but it was kinda worth it.

Edited May 20, 2015 by PKT1106

[L3324temp]

What am missing here??? It seems the MD and RM made the right decisions to limit the impact of the weather for the majority of the shooters. Good job.

Edited May 21, 2015 by L3324temp

[Nik Habicht]

I've yanked a couple of posts for violation of the prime directive. One of those posts was quoted by another member -- and the offending sentence was edited out of the quote by me. From the forum guidelines:

Posting Guidelines

Attitude
Please be polite. Or if not polite, at least respectful.
No bickering. Regardless of the subject matter.
Antagonistic, offensive, or quarrelsome tones are not acceptable.
No trolling. No alternate accounts.

Please keep the discussion on topic, and refrain from posting at each other. I'd still like to see a rules citation that allows for throwing a stage out for a weather delay, or for any other schedule change/delay. I can't find one -- but maybe I'm blind.....

[Corey]

I would agree that 2.3.4 would pertain to tossing stage that weather made unsuitable (flooding fallen tree, etc). We had a guy break his leg at the IN Sectional 2 years ago due to slipping in the mud and falling wrong. That stage got tossed because it became a safety issue. We also had multiple rain delays that day but managed to finish the rest of the match before the sun went down (it was getting close). IMO, it does not however, allow for a stage to be tossed for a delay (even one created by weather) that can't be cleaned up by the match crew before the match is over. If it can be cleaned up and the stage brought back to a shootable condition, then the match proceeds.

[wurm]

Would a refund be out of the question for the shooters who couldn't come back? Might make it easier to swallow not getting to finish the match.

[mikev49]

Would a refund be out of the question for the shooters who couldn't come back? Might make it easier to swallow not getting to finish the match.

yes, that would be out of the question. Its not the matches fault that you couldn't finish the next morning. Life goes on. Its not like anything was won or lost because you didnt finish. Oh wait maybe a $5 plaque.

[Nik Habicht]

Would a refund be out of the question for the shooters who couldn't come back? Might make it easier to swallow not getting to finish the match.

yes, that would be out of the question. Its not the matches fault that you couldn't finish the next morning. Life goes on. Its not like anything was won or lost because you didnt finish. Oh wait maybe a $5 plaque.

Not necessarily. That Sectional I mentioned earlier may have put a couple of competitors up in hotels overnight.....

Offering a free or reduced entry to the following year's match could also work. Not to mention the fact that well run established matches can generate lots of revenue -- once the props have been bought and paid for. (I'm well aware that if you need to order steel, movers, target stands or other props to hold a major that it may be challenging to pay the bills. On the other hand if your club has run a few in a row, the money situation should ease up.)

[Nghthwk1911]

This is like calling Shooter Connection after the match is complete and asking for a refund because the targets have holes.

You Show up, you shoot, and you work through it, if it rains it rains. If you don't cancel before the cut of you don't get a refund.

I am not even sure why this is a question at this point. Any sort of bending on this would lead down a slippery slop, like I had a bad day, I want a refund, it was too hot, I want a refund...

Not trying to be a hard ass on this, but really? Asking for a refund from a match that you came and shot after the fact, no matter the fact of your ability to finish the match or not. We had shooters just leave and never present to Chrono, and will not be scored, or just leave after a few stages for some reason (no idea why was never told they left), Can they ask for a refund, NO.

It is not like we walked up to them and told them to stop shooting just because, or did not offer them the ability to come back the next day to finish because of the weather.

[Fowlmouths]

Kevin,

Some people can't be satisfied. Thank you and all of the crew for putting on a great event.

P.S. I didn't do well on stage 8. Can I get a refund for the extra ammo I used on the partial head shots through the barrel?

[motosapiens]

I am not even sure why this is a question at this point. Any sort of bending on this would lead down a slippery slop, like I had a bad day, I want a refund, it was too hot, I want a refund...

I think that's a pretty silly analogy. A match director is like any other business, offering a product at an agreed-upon price. It sounds like for external reasons, the match director was unable to deliver the agreed-upon product to everyone. I'm not sure it's reasonable to put all the weather risk on the competitor. If it were me, I would probably consider a refund or a discounted entry into next year's match, or something. And I would probably try to take steps to be less vulnerable to weather next time, or advise competitors that if it goes haywire they may need to be prepared to stay an extra day.

I can see where someone would be a bit put off by being told to essentially just do it your way or go pound sand, especially if the number of affected shooters was fairly small.

Frankly, as a shooter, I would rather run the stage ill-prepared in the near dark and just suck it up than take a dnf if I couldn't come back. I realize that isn't always possible tho. I think I did the world's fastest make ready at SS nats so I could do my last run just as the deluge was starting. Of course we were scheduled to finish 3-4 hrs before dark, so there was plenty of cushion.

Edited May 21, 2015 by motosapiens

[Nghthwk1911]

I don't even know what to say to that.

Where did you get that I said go pound sand?

Weather happens, we play in a rain or shine sport, sometimes it rains, sometimes not. How can a MD or anyone running a match plan for refunds under this type of situation. Plan on giving a discount for the next match, come on Really??? who was "affected" by the rain (insert weather condition) for next match.

What is silly is anyone shooting this sport even for a nano-second thinking that asking for a refund for a match that had a stoppage for safety concerns is even a valid request.

Don't what to shoot in the outdoor weather, shoot inside.