Investigating ambient air quality of a shooting range during official national competitions

Shooting is among nine sports branches that formed the first modern Olympic Games in Athens in 1896. A professional shooting athlete shoots millions of bullets throughout their sports life to commune with their gun dedicatedly. The number of simultaneous shots per unit time depends on the capacity of the range. It can enormously increase when a national match is a case. Shooting can cause gunshot residue exposure, including lead, other elements, and their by-products accumulate in ambient air and reveal significant health risks. This study aims to find the levels of PM₁₀ and its chemical composition during official three-day 50 m 22-cal competitions in May 2016, Mersin, Turkey. To this end, PM₁₀ samples were collected on quartz-fiber filters and analyzed for elements by ICP-MS and carbonaceous material by Thermal-Optical EC/OC analyzer. The total PM₁₀ mass concentration average is 28.7±7.3 µg/m³ within the indoor threshold values of different countries. The ambient mass concentrations of PM₁₀, OC, EC, TC, Cd, and Pb were higher during once pistol matches instead of rifle matches. Although Pb values did not exceed the indoor limits for shooting ranges, it has the highest concentration among the analyzed elements. Additionally, Cr poses cancer risk potential. Except for Zn, Sr, and Cu, all the measured parameters have higher calculated emission factor (EF) values during pistol shots. To our best knowledge, this study reports the airborne mass concentrations of EC, OC, and TC from indoor shooting ranges and investigates indoor air quality for shooting sport for the first time.