How can you shoot a gun at a target if you cannot see it?

The Manx Blind Welfare Society has the answer.

Participants use their ears rather than their eyes.

’Acoustic shooting’ involves the use of adapted .177 calibre air rifles fitted with special sights, which measure the level of light reflected from the target and convert it into sound.

Participants wear headphones to hear the sound, which becomes more frequent the closer they are to the target.

There are 10 regular shooters who take part within the society and the man behind its success is David Wilson.

He said: ’The new equipment does things in a different way but gives the same result,and we will bring this new system in to members eventually.

’When you’ve shot, it will say on the headphones straight away where the shot went and where on the target the shot hit.

’The tricky thing about this is that you can’t use your sight to aim in any way - so people who can’t see can aim purely by listening to the noise which plays as the end of the gun is in the area of the target.’

David added: ’The new equipment was purchased by MBWS, but we received a 50% donation from the Isle of Man Target Shooting Federation. The total cost was almost £3,000.

’We purchased one new rifle and two of the new sighting systems.’

I tried it myself, closing my eyes and listening out for the frequency in the headphones to go up in pitch.

It was a lot harder than imagined, as sometimes when the rifle was dipped lower, the sound wouldn’t play out at all and so trying to re-centre was really quite difficult.

Samantha Ash, who was born completely blind, has won two medals for her efforts in acoustic shooting.

She said: ’I’ve been taking part in this since 2014. I’ve got two national shooting medals from the UK. I beat the police firearms team when we invited them!

’It teaches you different skills that you are able to use throughout your life - the art of being calm, the art of breathing, so it calms you down when you’re stressed.

’If we didn’t have this, we wouldn’t be able to shoot. The fact that we can shoot this way is very good - I really hope that one day this as a sport is included in the Paralympics.’

Samantha added: ’I’m still using the older equipment at the moment, but from what Dave tells me, the newer one is better in that he can tell me what I’ve got straight away rather than me having to listen to the feedback on the headphones.

’I can be really hard on myself when I don’t hit the target.

’But when I do get a good shot, my confidence goes up massively.

’Usually when you first come into MBWS, you get given five shots to take as practice. Then you spend about an hour or two during the contest and your arm can tire as it’s heavy.

’I think I ended up in division one for the league we last did, I got two silvers which I was surprised about.’

Samantha was up against shooters who had done it for over 20 years.

’The harder you focus the more you shake,’ she added.

More info about the charity is at mbws.org.im/