As a mother of sons who enjoy the sport of airsoft gun wars with the use of pellets, I wanted to share with you a study done regarding eye injuries. This report/study was conducted by our friends who are ophthalmologist that specialize in retina surgery. I will attempt to paraphrase so that we laypeople might better understand their findings. Essentially the emphasis is on consistent use of protective equipment, especially goggles or full facemasks.
Since the early 80’s, airsoft guns have been used for:
-military training situations
-airsoft gun competition
-training of law enforcement and security
-recreational airsoft gun shooting, usually in simulated war games.
Many entrepreneurs initially purchased equipment and leased land to promote these war games. Each person is equipped with carbon dioxide-powered gun and protective eyewear. As airsoft guns and pellets have become easier to obtain, the use of these dangerous weapons at home has become more popular.
Each player at a war game facility is required to wear eye protection consisting of goggles or full facial headgear. Sometimes the goggles may be knocked off during play or may become foggy or dirty and be removed temporarily for cleaning. Although such facilities require eye protection, no such requirements exist at other sites, like at home.
Many eye injuries have been reported since 1985 regarding the pellet injuries. Most of these reports indicate that failure welder supply cable to wear eye protection resulted in injury, though some injuries occurred despite proper use of eye protection.
Results: Eye injury in 10 patients, 7 of the ten did not have eye protection at the time of injury, 2 patients had goggles in position (the pellet entered under the goggles), and 1 patient wore a full-face helmet. Only one patient was playing at an airsoft game facility, and the other 9 were playing recreationally at home or a friend’s home.
Six patients had surgery. At the one year follow up of these patients: all who had surgery for the airsoft pellet injury had improvement in final visual acuity compared to their initial visual acuity assessment. The 4 patients who did not have surgery had the best initial visual acuity, but did not however, have the best final visual acuity.
Conclusion: Blunt trauma to the eye caused by these pellets can result in severe ocular injury and permanent loss of vision. Emphasis by manufacturers on eye safety measures and mandatory packaging of eye protection with all airsoft-related items might be helpful to public safety education in reducing visual injury from these airsoft war games. Therefore, take precautions during play and when you purchase airsoft guns, please purchase eye protection and USE IT during play. Your eye site would be a terrible thing to loose.
Factual basis of this article is from a study done by Department of Ophthalmology and demand and supply pdf Vitreoretinal Surgery, University of Alabama at Birmingham, School of Medicine.
