Muzzle down range at all times. Got a brass problem? Set the firearm down FIRST:
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Absolutely.
I was at Range 14 once and a guy was helping his wife/gf learn to shoot. She got hot brass down the back of her shirt and started rotating back across the firing line with weapon still in hand. Thankfully the gut was sharp enough to see what was happening and safely got the gun out of her hand and on the table before anything bad could have happened.
The burn sucks but it’s better than accidentally killing someone…
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Saw a VERY experienced shooter get DQ’d at a USPSA match because she flagged the shit out of everyone when a hot case went down her back.
Fortunately her finger was off the trigger so nothing bad happened.
I dealt with this issue many times. I ran the firearms training program for about 200 agents. I told them ac gr wear a baseball cap, long sleeves, and a shirt that fit tightly around the neck in addition to eye and ear protection. Wearing a raid jacket agents kept in their car could meet this. But not always perfect.
Two incidents.
Had a well endowed woman agent show up with an open necked shirt for qualifications. She caught a piece of hot brass in her cleavage. Dropped her pistol and ran downrange whilst everyone else was still shooting. No one was injured by the grace of God.
I wonder how someone like that would react if they got a peripheral hit in a gunfight.
Other incident. I was running the firing line during M4 training. Wearing long sleeve and tight neck shirt, baseball cap, eye and ear protection. I was standing maybe 15 feet behind the firing line. A piece of 5.56 brass went under the bill of my cap and lodged itself on top of my eye protection. I had to take off the hat and my eye protection to dislodge it. I just sucked up the pain. I wound up with a 2nd degree burn on my eyebrow.
Stuff happens no matter what you do.
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Years ago when I got my wife her first gun…a Beretta Tomcat in 22lr. Her first shot at the range and the hot brass landed above her eyebrow between the glasses and got stuck there causing a burn she can still show you today. It took a lot of coaxing to get her confidence back. Be careful out there.
22LR is the worst in this regard! I’ve had the same thing happen to me. Gets everywhere no matter how hard you try to prevent it.