I’m sure someone else will give better reports than me. I’m way too tired. But lets just say the fire last Sunday didn’t scare me nearly as much as the one we had today. And we have a dozen people to fight this one.

Everyone seemed to have a good time and what surprised me most was that they seemed to enjoy me just standing around and telling stories as much as making explosives and blowing mud all over everyone.

And then there was the awesome picture Ry took. The target has HIGH SPEED flames shooting out of the sides just before it is reduced to it’s molecular components–and you can see the bullet hole in the target. I’m sure he will post it sometime. It’s just a question of him having bandwidth, both computer and personal, to do it.

Tomorrow we start cranking out targets while most of the gun blogger crew participates in the Precision Rifle Clinic.

I went to Office Depot today to pick up some supplies for Boomershoot. I bought three pounds (it annoys me they are by the pound rather than the count) of #6 rubber bands, 200 clip on name badges, and a self-inking stamp. Everyone was nice until I told them what I wanted on the stamp. Then I noticed a distinct chill in their attitude.

I’m not sure what it could have been but it must have been one of the following lines:

Extreme Danger!!
Contains High Explosives
FlashTek, Cavendish ID 208-301-4254
Lot 2009-4-      Shift 1

I just got a call from a 14 year old kid in Michigan that wanted to know a bunch of things about being an “explosives specialist”. The most memorable questions were:

• Q: What is most important about your career? A: Safety. Being very, very detail oriented and being careful.


• Q: What do you like most about your career? A: Making people happy and changing the way people think about gun and explosives.

I also told him that if he was serious about explosives as a career he should consider something other than doing Boomershoot type events. He should look into demolition, mining, and certain specialties in the military. I should have mentioned road construction but I didn’t think of it until after we had said goodbye.

As I reported yesterday due to a failure in communications one of the Boomershoot spectators showed up a week early on Saturday night. I felt so bad about it that we put on a private party for them. They got the full Boomershoot experience. From helping fold the boxes for the targets (a staff t-shirt will be delivered within a week or two), seeing the targets made, shooting boomers, seeing an awesome fireball (Caleb was some distance away and thought it had enveloped us) and even helping to put out a fire.

Son-in-law Caleb and daughter Kim starting the box folding. We ended up with about 65 crates of empty boxes.

Our guest after hitting her first boomer.

Notice there is still a smile as she prepares to engage the next one.

The second boomer in the early stages of earth movement. Notice the dirt moving outward?

Our shooter was 25 yards from the boomers. Almost Entertainingly Close.

Due to some technical difficulties I shot the fireball target and there was no one on the camera.
This is want it looked like about 15 seconds after detonation. Notice the flames to the far left.

After about 15 minutes of fire fighting. We were very glad it was near the creek and we had buckets to move water with.
Click to see a higher resolution version.

While at the Boomershoot site yesterday I didn’t have cell phone service (AT&T). Last year it was fine. Even yesterday it would, for a minute or so, have “four bars” but then it would go to zero. In one of those bursts of service, around 1330, I received notice I had a voice mail. I immediately tried to call out and retrieve it but even when there was signal indicated the call would not go through. “Oh, well,” I thought, “It probably was just the girls at the house wanting me to pick up something at the store on the way home. I’ll get the message on my way home.”

I checked the voice mail about 1715 on top of a hill as I was leaving the area. A chill went through me. It was someone from work that was, “Just leaving Seattle.” The time on the message was 1100. They expected to be in Orofino by 1700 in time for the Boomershoot dinner. Yeah, that would be in plenty of time for the dinner. Exactly seven days early. “See you tonight they said.” And, I was told, “I found accommodations at the Helgeson.”

They had stopped by my office on Friday to talk to my office-mate and then we talked about going to see Boomershoot this year. They wanted to watch and also see the explosives being made but exactly which Saturday and Sunday was apparently miscommunicated.

I called back but there was no answer and I left voice mail. There is no AT&T cell service in Orofino and I was pretty sure they have AT&T as their carrier. When I got back to Moscow I called their phone again, which went to voice mail, and then the Helgeson. They hadn’t checked in yet. I sent a text message to their cell. An hour later I called the Helgeson again. Yes, they had checked in and got my message but they had just left. I expressed my concern that they might not have cell phone service, which was confirmed. I said I would call back in an hour.

About an hour later they called me from a land-line in Orofino. I apologized profusely for the miscommunication and told them we were going back out to the site tomorrow and they would get a “private party”. They will get to see the explosives being made, get to detonate several boomers from “entertainingly close” ranges, have lunch with my parents, and maybe even test out a new fireball construction method I thought of.

Pictures tonight or tomorrow.

Both the conditions on site now and the forecast for the rest of the week look absolutely awesome. It’s a little wet right now but still easily dealt with. The forecast is for the weather to be clear or scattered clouds until Friday with temperatures sometimes reaching the upper 70s. That should dry things out. Friday night, after the High Intensity event there is a strong possibility of showers. Which would wash away any spilled Boomerite minimizing the chances of a fire. From then though Sunday night it is supposed to be cloudy with temperatures in the upper 60s with, again, a chance of rain Sunday night after the event is over. I couldn’t ask for a better forecast.

Here are some pictures from yesterday:

The daffodils are starting to bloom on the shooters berm.

All the snow in the shooting areas is gone.

The road into the shooters area is nearly dry.

Even with one of the seats removed the van was packed with equipment and supplies.

The Taj was over crowed after the van was unloaded.

The target prep area was dry.

I “paved” the work area where we walked in mud last year.

I found three small patches of snow on the property. This was the largest at 1:21 in the afternoon.

The same patch of snow three hours later at 4:18. I suspect it will be gone when I visit the site today.

Just after Boomershoot 2008 I received the following email:

Sent: Sunday, April 27, 2008 2:46 PM
Subject: boomershoot

Joe,

Once again I want to thank you for ruining another fine Cavendish springtime weekend; as you well know, they are far and few between in this “quiet” North Idaho community. I spent the weekend caring for my dog who is absolutely terrified of the noise generated by your idiotic activities of one quarter of a mile away. I also spent fifty dollars at the vet for tranquilizers to get him through the ordeal.

Too bad you can’t direct your intelligence to a more constructive cause.

XXX XXX, a resident of Cavendish for 37 years.

I forwarded the email to a friend who works with dogs and asked for advice. I then procrastinated for nearly a year before attempting to address the issue in a polite manner. My attempt was:

From: Joe Huffman [mailto:joeh@boomershoot.org]
Sent: Friday, April 17, 2009 11:52 AM
Subject: RE: boomershoot

I’m very sorry you and your dogs are upset by the noise. I have consulted someone who has worked with dogs who had problems with loud noises and she had some suggestions. I thought she might be able to attend again this year. She had offered to stop by and work with you and your dogs some. It turns out she will not be able to attend. Her comments:

Tell him that one of the range safety officers is disabled woman, and has a service dog who can be at close range and the dog is practically unfazed by the sounds of close-up gunfire/explosives.* This dog was once-fretful/skittish dog at the slightest sound — even that of a falling leaf (no joke). The dog is a survivor of brutal beatings due do gang-related pit bull abuse but has overcome most of the sound-related trauma, thanks to training and desensitization, so the dog can now handle loud sounds.

Every dog is different. We’ve had other people w/ their dogs attend Boomershoot in the past and their dogs seem unfazed by the sounds. In fact, the neighbor dog is so unfazed by Boomershoot sounds, he sometimes playfully runs through the field (aka shooting range), and we call a “cease fire” to ensure the dog’s safety. We’ve waited up to 30 minutes before, until the dog playfully ran back home.

I have to disagree with you on the view that the activities are “idiotic”. Thousands of people think otherwise. The Seattle KING5 television station did a very positive video of the event which was nominated for an Emmy award in 2006. Newsweek and Outside Magazine and others have had positive articles on it as well. People travel from all across the country and sometimes (including this year) even from Europe to participate. This year, as nearly every other year, we have spectators driving from the Seattle area just to watch. All have found it to be a constructive cause.

Again, I’m sorry our once a year activities cause your dogs so much anxiety. We are having another event next weekend with a few boomers going off on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday and hundreds of them on Sunday the 26^th. If it would help I would be glad to compensate you for the problems with your dogs. I would be glad to send you a check for $50 to cover the medications or for you to take them someplace else. If this is agreeable to you please give me your mailing address and I’ll get the check in the mail as soon as I can.

Regards,

Joe Huffman
Boomershoot Event Director
P.S. It’s over a mile away, not 0.25 mile.

The email bounced so I forwarded it to my brother Doug asking if he had a current email address for our neighbor. He did not but offered that I might be able to find his work email address. Then a couple hours later I received the following email from one of my cousins in the area:

Sent: Friday, April 17, 2009 2:34 PM
To: Joe Huffman
Cc: Doug Huffman
Subject: dogs

Hey Joe,
Our German Shepherds are becoming very anxious and even upset in anticipation of the upcoming boomer shoot. I think the cat maybe disturbed also, however all three say that fifty pounds of T-bones would probably settle their nerves.

He had me going there for the first half of a sentence but I figured it out and fired off the following reply:

From: Joe Huffman
Sent: Friday, April 17, 2009 3:09 PM
Cc: ‘Doug Huffman’
Subject: RE: dogs

Would that be 50 pounds each or 50 pounds combined?

And since you didn’t specify I will assume any bone tributes can be delivered in powdered form.

-joe-

The things I have to put up with for Boomershoot…

Things are looking really good to me. I delivered about a half ton of supplies to the Taj Mahal this morning without getting stuck or even cutting into the ground much with my van.

The snow is essentially all gone. I was able find a little bit of snow but I had to look for it and it is likely to be gone by Boomershoot time.

I’ll post pictures tonight or tomorrow.

Update 1453: Live blogging from the Boomershoot site.

I’ve verified the problem with our “well” is that it doesn’t have any water in it rather than a problem with the pump or the pipe. I put about five gallons in it and I was able to pump water out just fine.

Boomershoot 2009 shirts and mugs are available here.

The image is:

Two weeks out and there is still snow–via email from brother Doug this morning:

The snow is mostly gone. Still some on the north slopes, but a lot of that has melted in the last few days. It is supposed to get cold and snow again today and tomorrow, but be warm and sunny by the end of the week.

I’ll be onsite next Saturday and/or Sunday and report back then. Only a week out the forecasts will be pretty accurate and I will be able to tell you what sort of conditions we will have. Expect mud. Especially for my staff placing targets at the tree line.

I had another cancellation.

There are two positions now available. One in the Lowlands (#16) and one in the Main area (#29) next to a bunch of gun bloggers.

Sign up here.

Last Sunday I visited the Boomershoot site to check out the snow conditions and do a little bit of prep work. The pictures mostly speak for themselves. Compare to the pictures I took the week before. And the same time last year.

View from the entrance to the shooting area.

View from standing on the shooting berm at about position 50.

The north (shooters area) side of the shooting berm. The snow is 16 inches deep in places.

This is the culvert that was overflowing the week before. Yes, those are my snowshoe tracks.

Here is where we build the targets.

Just some of the mouse damage. I’m taking rodent poison with me the next time I go.

Mouse nest in the explosives magazine.

There were seven baby mice in the nest I threw out into the snow. Micecicles for the birds. The two adults got away.

Position #47 is filled.

Positions #29 and #30 are now both open.

There are some restrictions on position #29. Position #29 will be in use on Friday and Saturday. You will not be able to set up in that position until sometime on Saturday evening. On Sunday position #29 will be covered with a canopy provided by and shared with the people in positions #25 -> #28.

Sign up here.

Update: Position #30 was taken in about 90 minutes. Position #29 would probably be gone in seconds if I said who took position #30. But privacy matters so I won’t.

Position 7 is filled but I had another cancellation due to a spouse with cancer having surgery the day after Boomershoot.

Position 47 is now open. Sign up here.

We had another cancellation.

Position 7 is now open. Sign up here:

http://entry.boomershoot.org/

Update: Gone in under two hours.

Ry’s asshole dial goes to 11.

I think I’ll let him try it.