I just had a very real incident happen tonight. I had a friend stop by while I was reloading in my garage. I left to go have some beers with him in the house. Not more than five minutes later, we all hear popping noises. For some reason, I knew exactly what it was. Sure enough, I go back into my garage and gun smoke has filled the room. I cautiously approached my reloading bench as rounds are still popping off and see charged, but bullet-less cases burning one by one. Luckily for me, I have five fire extiguishers in my garage, so both me and my buddy go to town unloading all of them on the reloading bench, followed by several spray bottles of water.
The aftermath:
Most of the popping I heard was a box of .22 LR I had on the bench, some of it, some fully loaded .308 rounds in a plastic container. Luckily the cases exploded and the bullets didnt have enough energy to penetrate the walls or ceiling from what I can see:
I'm still trying to figure out what started all this, but I found a possible culprit. This CFL bulb looks like it exploded, however Im not sure if a bullet hit it, or if it blew on its own accord:
As a testament to RCBS, my Chargemaster had half a container of powder in it, which all got cooked out, however the Chargemaster still turns on:
Luckily the only damage so far is all of my bullet cases, an MTM maintenance station, maybe a few dies, and part of my bench. Oh, and my ego...
If it wasnt for my fire extinguishers, I'd probably be sleeping on the street right now.
PLEASE PLEASE, always consider safety first. Dont ever smoke while reloading, make sure your reloading equipment as well as surrounding equipment is safe, and never leave your reloading station unattended unless you are absolutely sure everything is properly stored and safe. After this incident I am definitely buying a fire proof cabinet for all flammable items. Its sad it takes an incident like this for me to consider taking extra safety steps, but it happens.
The aftermath:
Most of the popping I heard was a box of .22 LR I had on the bench, some of it, some fully loaded .308 rounds in a plastic container. Luckily the cases exploded and the bullets didnt have enough energy to penetrate the walls or ceiling from what I can see:
I'm still trying to figure out what started all this, but I found a possible culprit. This CFL bulb looks like it exploded, however Im not sure if a bullet hit it, or if it blew on its own accord:
As a testament to RCBS, my Chargemaster had half a container of powder in it, which all got cooked out, however the Chargemaster still turns on:
Luckily the only damage so far is all of my bullet cases, an MTM maintenance station, maybe a few dies, and part of my bench. Oh, and my ego...
If it wasnt for my fire extinguishers, I'd probably be sleeping on the street right now.
PLEASE PLEASE, always consider safety first. Dont ever smoke while reloading, make sure your reloading equipment as well as surrounding equipment is safe, and never leave your reloading station unattended unless you are absolutely sure everything is properly stored and safe. After this incident I am definitely buying a fire proof cabinet for all flammable items. Its sad it takes an incident like this for me to consider taking extra safety steps, but it happens.
