ADCMS,
Your knee jerk reaction was to claim that it was just an accident so we should do nothing because other wise we have to ban cars and nail guns. I am saying that you can ban small children from having or using this type of weapons, you don't have to ban cars as well.
Should we ban small children from other dangerous activities? Personally I think each case should be looked at on it's own merits. In this case you have a culture developing that directly puts people in danger and hence legislation is appropriate. So in answer to your question no, you are not going to see things banned because a 'special interest' group (for that read general public) says so, each case is going to be different.
Perhaps you should look at it another way, you live in a democracy, that democracy imposes its will on you in lots of different ways; how many members of the general public have to die before the general public get to decide for you that your way of life is too dangerous to tolerate?
I asked TD to expand on a point he made earlier, I am an engineer I am interested to know if TD thinks there were technical reasons why this weapon is so dangerous in the hands of children? You seem to be reading a lot into my posts, I have no retort for TD, it's just an interesting technical detail. Would it make any difference to my conclusion that it is simple to ban children from using this sort of weapon? No, but that doesn't mean I cannot ask someone a question. I am also interested in why you think I should not ask TD a question?
I'm afraid I was unaware that people let children engage in such a stupidly dangerous activity before this story broke, if you had asked me a month ago I would have said the same thing.
I would say the owner and manager of the range should be held partly responsible for the instructors death for allowing this in the first place.