Hearing and Eye Protection: The Gear Most People Get Wrong

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May 14, 2026 · Dan Ribacoff, NRA-Certified Instructor

The scale of the problem

A handgun gunshot is somewhere in the region of 150 to 165 decibels at the shooter's ear. Hearing damage begins around 85 decibels with prolonged exposure, and the decibel scale is logarithmic, meaning each 10 dB roughly represents a tenfold increase in intensity.

There is no safe number of unprotected gunshots. Damage from impulse noise is instantaneous, permanent and cumulative, and tinnitus — persistent ringing — does not go away.

Indoor facilities are worse than outdoor because sound reflects off concrete and steel rather than dissipating. A busy indoor facility on a Saturday in Fort Lauderdale is one of the loudest environments most people will ever stand in.

Why this affects your shooting, not just your ears

Here is the part that surprises people. Inadequate hearing protection is a direct contributor to flinch development.

Recoil anticipation is a learned startle response. The startle stimulus is not primarily the push of recoil — it is the blast: the concussive pressure wave and the noise. Reduce that stimulus and the response weakens.

Students who upgrade from a single set of mediocre muffs to properly fitted plugs under electronic muffs frequently report an immediate improvement in group size, and it is not mysterious. They stopped bracing.

Understanding NRR

Noise Reduction Rating is the number printed on hearing protection packaging. Higher is better, but the arithmetic is not intuitive: the real-world reduction is meaningfully less than the printed number, and doubling up does not simply add the two ratings together.

The practical rule: for indoor facilities and for anyone shooting rifles or magnum handguns, wear both. Foam plugs correctly inserted under muffs gives you a combined reduction that neither achieves alone.

Choosing hearing protection

Type	Pros	Cons
Foam plugs	Cheap, high reduction, work under muffs	Block conversation entirely; must be inserted correctly
Passive muffs	Simple, durable, no batteries	Bulky; interfere with rifle stock weld; block instruction
Electronic muffs	Amplify speech, cut gunshots, hear safety commands	Batteries; more expensive
Electronic in-ear	Low profile, good for rifle shooting	Expensive; fit-dependent
Custom moulded	Excellent fit and comfort	Costly; require fitting

For lessons specifically, electronic muffs are strongly preferable because they let you hear an instructor between strings without removing anything. Communication during a lesson is a large part of the value, and a student who cannot hear corrections is getting a fraction of the session.

For rifle shooting, muffs can interfere with a proper cheek weld on the stock. In-ear electronic protection or lower-profile muffs solve this.

Eye protection

Less discussed and equally non-negotiable. The hazards are real and varied:

• Ejected brass, which arrives hot and at speed.
• Fragments of bullet jacket or lead spattering back from steel targets and backstops.
• Unburnt powder blown back from the ejection port.
• Solvents and lubricants during cleaning.
• In rare cases, a catastrophic firearm failure.

Ordinary prescription glasses and fashion sunglasses are not adequate. You want eyewear rated to a recognised impact standard — ANSI Z87.1 in the United States, or the military MIL-PRF-31013 standard for a higher level. The rating is usually marked on the frame or lens.

• Wraparound designs give side protection, which matters for brass coming from the lane beside you.
• Clear or lightly tinted lenses for indoor facilities; sunglasses are too dark to see sights properly indoors.
• Amber or yellow lenses improve contrast in overcast South Florida conditions.
• If you wear prescription glasses, use over-glasses safety eyewear or get prescription safety glasses.
• Anti-fog treatment is genuinely useful here — a summer morning at an outdoor facility in Broward County will fog untreated lenses within minutes.

Protection for guests and children

Anyone in the vicinity of the firing line needs both, including spectators, children, and the friend who came along to watch. Youth-sized muffs exist and fit far better than adult ones perched on a small head.

Infants and very young children should simply not be at a live-fire facility. Their hearing is more vulnerable and no consumer protection is adequate for that exposure.

Maintenance and replacement

Muff ear seals compress and harden over time, and a hardened seal leaks badly — a set of muffs from ten years ago may be providing a fraction of its rated protection. Replacement seal kits are inexpensive and worth fitting every couple of years, particularly in Florida where heat and UV accelerate the degradation.

Foam plugs are single-use or few-use items. Reusing a compressed, dirty plug is both less effective and an ear infection risk.

Scratched eye protection scatters light and degrades your sight picture. Replace lenses when they cloud — they are consumable safety equipment, not permanent gear.

All protective equipment is provided for students who do not own their own, and we will happily check that yours is fitted correctly, because a large number of shooters have never had that checked by anyone.

An honest household safety audit

Set aside twenty minutes and work through the following questions about your own home. Most firearm owners find at least one gap, and gaps are much easier to close before they matter.

• Is every firearm in the house stored to a standard appropriate to its role, or are some simply sitting where they were last put down?
• If you keep a defensive firearm accessible, can you open its container in the dark, in under three seconds, having practised recently?
• Does everyone in the household — including people who do not shoot — know the four rules and what to do if they encounter a firearm?
• Have you asked the parents of your children's friends whether firearms in their homes are secured?
• Do you have a written, rehearsed dry fire protocol, or do you improvise each time?
• When did you last inspect stored firearms for corrosion? In South Florida humidity, this should be a matter of months rather than years.
• Is your ammunition stored somewhere cool and dry, and have you rotated defensive ammunition recently rather than repeatedly re-chambering the same round?

None of this requires expensive equipment. It requires deciding once, deliberately, rather than letting arrangements accumulate by default.

Train with a certified instructor in South Florida

Reading about shooting is useful. Being watched while you shoot is transformative — because the faults that limit you are, almost by definition, the ones you cannot see yourself. Delray Firearms Training provides private, NRA-certified instruction with Dan Ribacoff throughout Palm Beach County and Broward County, including Delray Beach, Boca Raton, Boynton Beach, West Palm Beach, Fort Lauderdale, Coral Springs and Weston.

Lessons are one-on-one by default, arranged by appointment seven days a week, and shaped around your experience level rather than a fixed script. Whether you have never fired a shot or you have carried for twenty years and want a specific problem solved, the starting point is a short conversation.

Call 516-315-2809 Request a Time

About the instructor

Dan Ribacoff is an NRA-certified firearms instructor, licensed private investigator and career security professional who has spent decades in investigations, executive protection and private security. He teaches handgun, rifle, carbine, shotgun, concealed carry, home defense and maintenance courses across South Florida. Read more about Dan →

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