The project to build a national shooting range in the limits of Mosta should have received widespread support. It is the culmination of years of work by members of the sports shooting community.

Sports shooting really is the safest sport practised in Malta. Such is the result of carefully-drafted laws which only allow individuals of good conduct, with appropriate training and who have shown genuine interest in sports shooting, to have a licence to purchase and use a firearm for target shooting at a licensed range.

Clubs vet each applicant individually, require that such individuals attend training by certified instructors and only then recommend successful applicants to the police for the issuance of a licence. The police, then, independently, conduct a separate vetting process and subject applicants to an examination of knowledge of gun safety before they proceed to issue such a licence.

Target shooters are supervised by range conducting officers at the range. These are people specially trained by the clubs and separately examined and licensed by the police.

The safety record for these individuals is excellent because clubs and the police cooperate to keep it that way.

Sports shooting has also achieved some of the best results internationally for any sports discipline in Malta. We have world-class shooters in one discipline and in other areas successes have also been achieved, such as in the areas of sports rifle and dynamic target shooting. Further progress is limited by the unavailability of adequate range facilities for dynamic pistol and target rifle.

The setting up of a national range in Mosta, with the strong probability to host world championship events and attract world-class shooters for practice sessions will allow the discipline to flourish and bring further honours to Malta.

Arguably, the spring hunting referendum outcome was conditioned by a reluctance of the Maltese to impose their personal values on a minority.

Promises that all hobbies were safe and that all minority groups’ rights would be respected have just been broken

Significantly, less than one month after the referendum, the repeated promises that all hobbies were safe and that all minority groups’ rights would be respected have just been broken.

The argument against the range project is that it shall destroy, or at least significantly impact, the peace and tranquillity of the nearby Mount St Joseph Retreat House, which is described as Malta’s last oasis of silence.

Factual data to substantiate such claims were not presented at the Jesuit press conferences.

Typically, newspapers carried the story as it was presented and reporters did not take time to analyse the arguments. The arguments were simply carried as presented and echoed by numerous readers’ letters repeating the same.

The recent despicable anonymous letter by one individual has only served to muddy the already dirty waters as did the reaction of some members of the Society of Jesus, with their unsubstantiated finger-pointing at the developers.

The facts are easily available to anyone who has access to the internet and are easy to extrapolate to the current range project since the developers have made the plans public.

A number of ranges in the United Kingdom and other European countries lie less than 200 metres away from private residencies. Professional noise impact assessments for such projects have been performed and the required noise attenuation to achieve zero noise pollution at the surrounding properties is outlined in such documents, freely available online.

It is possible to attenuate the noise from the shooting of both minor and major calibre target pistols and rifles and to achieve zero to minimal impact on the average background noise in a nearby residential area.

In lay terms, the shooting noise will either be inaudible or else at the same level as normal conversational voice at 200 metres. At 400 metres, the sound intensity falls by another 75 per cent since sound follows the inverse square law (as distance propagated doubles, intensity falls by a factor of four).

Extrapolating this to the local context, although the national range boundary is indeed 140 metres from Mount St Joseph boundary wall, the shooting points are more than 400 metres away and much farther than that from the gardens. Thus, it should be very easy to attenuate any firing noises to a more than acceptable level.

For the record, the difference between a distance of 140 metres and 400 metres is equivalent to an 87.25 per cent difference in sound intensity.

Last weekend, I was shooting at a range in Qormi. I took time to measure the impact of shooting noise from large calibre pistols being used, namely 9mm and 0.40 calibre sports pistols, firing standard factory-produced ammunition.

At the firing points, the background sound level (produced by wind, birds, etc.) was around 55 decibels (55 dB) at its peak. With normal conversational voices this rose to 65 dB and then to 75 dB with loud conversation (such as when range commands were shouted out).

During shooting, the noise level rose to 115 dB maximum, which is loud enough to damage hearing if one is exposed without protection for long periods.

However, at a distance of 80 metres, the noise of the pistol shots fell to merely 65 dB, that is the sound intensity of normal conversational voice.

At 400 metres, the sound intensity shall fall by another 96 per cent and shall therefore be perfectly inaudible.

The sound of air pistols, air rifles and minor calibre target pistols shall be much less than that measured for the pistols we used. Rifles produce higher sound intensity and attenuation may be required for this. However, zero impact on the retreat at 400 metres is not only possible but really an easy target to achieve.

Furthermore, any actual noise pollution from the national range would presumably be objected to by the Jesuits in future and the range owners and operators could then install additional measures to eliminate it. The approval of the range is not a one stage process and any Mepa approval would not give the owners a mandate to disturb their neighbours.

One argument the Jesuits have made is that up to 10,000 people use the facility each year, representing more than 25 people a day. Do the Jesuits really want us to believe that 25 children, or adults, for that matter, would sit in the garden in total absolute silence?

The noise of two people having a normal conversation (65 Db) is comparable to the noise from a large calibre rifle 400 metres away, without attenuation measures in place. With proper attenuation, the rifle shot could not possibly be heard by two people in normal conversation.

While at the range, an aircraft flew overhead. In terms of actual sound pressure, the plane’s engines generated 85 dB at ground level, much more than a pistol shot at 80 metres.

It is interesting that in all the press releases and all the letters extolling Mount St Joseph as an oasis of silence, no-one cared to mention that the retreat house is in the airport approach flight path and is regularly exposed to high intensity aircraft noise. Such noise would by far exceed that of shooting at the range 400 metres away.

The Jesuits at Mount St Joseph have every right to express their concerns about the noise generated at the national shooting range nearly half a kilometre away but they do not have the right to impose closure of the project on the basis of an unsubstantiated argument.

An ethical objection process would have to be based on evidence and not on the stirring of emotional popular support for an imagined impact made ‘fact’ simply by its repetition.

The range project supporters are looking into the real impact of shooting noise and the Jesuits should be ready to listen to their proposals before taking action.

The ethical way to object to a development should be through a process of discussion and negotiation, informed by objective evidence.

Jean Karl Soler is a specialist in family and occupational medicine.

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