Always.
Your editor had a recent reminder about wearing personal protective equipment. And it’s a good thing I was wearing it at the time, else I might have lost an eye.
You see, I had a case rupture yesterday while shooting one of my MilSurp rifles. That rupture vented hot gasses directly back into my face. Had I not been wearing eye pro, I would have suffered serious eye injuries.
It was a French MAS-36, the standard issue French Army rifle from 1938 until it was replaced by the MAS-49 in the 1950s.
It fires a 7.5mmx54 cartridge that has similar ballistics to a .308 Winchester. It is somewhat difficult to find on the commercial market, so I handload for it. My guess is the case ruptured because it had been reloaded more than it should have been.
PPE isn’t just eye pro.
Remember your hearing protection, and not just at the range. Running your gas string trimmer? Wear ear pro. The average noise rating for a gas trimmer is 90dB. Anything over 80 can cause hearing damage. And because hearing damage is cumulative, continuous exposure to noises over 70dB will affect your hearing. For comparison, the sound measurement inside an average car going 65 down the highway is around 65dB. I’ve been lucky as far as hearing loss goes, but I do suffer from a hellacious case of tinnitus, which is another effect of noise exposure. It’s so bad I have to sleep with a fan on just to mitigate the ringing in my ears.
Then there are gloves, chaps and steel-toed boots. If you are working in an environment that requires additional protection, say with a chainsaw, make sure you’re using the appropriate PPE. An acquaintance had a mishap with a chainsaw not too long ago. He was wearing cut-resistant chaps and saved himself a serious injury.