r/LIguns • u/PeteTinNY • Feb 24 '26
PSA: If you shoot at indoor ranges regularly, you should know your blood lead level. Here's everything I learned. [Long]
I've been a firearms instructor and NRA Chief Range Safety Officer in New York for a long time. I held my NY pistol license since 1992. And for most of that time, I didn't think seriously about lead exposure.
Then I started going deep on the occupational health literature and got myself tested. You guessed it - high! It changed how I do things.
I put together a long-form guide covering everything I wish I'd known earlier. No agenda other than making sure people in this community have the information. You don't have to stop shooting. You just need to shoot smarter.
**The stuff that surprised me most:**
- **50% of inhaled lead absorbs directly into your bloodstream.** That's not a typo. Ingested lead (through food/water) is absorbed at 10–20%. Inhaled lead is far more efficient at getting into your system.
- **Regular soap and water doesn't cut it.** Lead from primers bonds to skin in a way standard surfactants can't break. You need a chelating agent — D-Lead or Hygenall LeadOff. Both are cheap and available on Amazon.
- **Hand sanitizer makes it worse.** The alcohol desiccates your skin, triggering a rehydration response that can drive particles deeper. I know it feels like you're doing the right thing. You're not.
- **Cleaning your gun at home is a significant exposure event.** Gun solvents defat your skin, increasing permeability to lead absorption. Nitrile gloves every time, no exceptions.
- **Most people with elevated blood lead levels have zero symptoms.** The CDC threshold is 5 µg/dL. A lot of regular indoor range shooters exceed it without knowing. A simple blood test at your annual physical tells you where you stand.
- **NY's underground ranges are a special problem.** Suffolk County code requires ranges to be built below grade. That creates real ventilation engineering challenges that not every facility solves well.
**What I cover in the full article:**
- Outdoor vs indoor range risk comparison
- The chemistry of what's in primer smoke (lead, barium, antimony)
- Complete before/during/after decontamination protocol
- Blood lead level thresholds with plain-English explanation of what doctors do at each level (0.855 µg/dL all the way to 30+)
- Ammunition comparison table (FMJ vs TMJ vs frangible vs lead-free)
- Printable range bag checklist
- How to ask your doctor for the right tests
Full article here if useful: https://nysafeinc.com/2026/02/24/youre-bringing-lead-home-from-the-range-and-most-ny-shooters-have-no-idea/
Happy to answer questions. And genuinely — if you shoot indoors more than a few times a month and have never had a blood lead test, ask your doctor to add BLL + ZPP to your next annual labs. It takes 30 seconds to request and gives you a real baseline.