FAQs About Archery Dangers

The use of a bow and arrow presents a number of dangers to archers and others around them, it is important that care is taken to prevent injury to anyone in the vicinity. This FAQ addresses common archery danger concerns.

Q: Is archery a safe sport?

A: Archery is one of the safest sporting activities widely practiced in the United States, and has an injury frequency lower than baseball, soccer and football. When proper care is taken and equipment is routinely inspected, the injury potential for the sport of archery is a minimal consideration.

Q: What are common safety considerations in archery?

A: Archery uses a bow with a high-tension string which may break during use and present a potential danger to the skin and eyes. Also, the archery bow launches arrows which are high-velocity projectiles with the potential to cause fatal injury.

Q: What is the proper method of inspecting a bow?

A: Bows are safest when inspected prior to every use. Frays in the bow strings and cracks in the body of the bow or in any of the peripheral components of the bow, require replacement before use to ensure stability and integrity of the bow and its parts.

Q: What is the proper method of inspecting arrows?

A: Though breakage of the bow presents a danger to the archer, flaws in the arrow may result in injury to people near the archer. An arrow is built of three major parts: the shaft, point and nock, and proper inspection of these three components is required for safe participation. The point of the arrow is the forward end which strikes the target, the shaft is the long body of the arrow and the nock is the notched back end that rests against the bow string prior to launch. Inspect each of these three pieces of an arrow to verify there are no cracks, scrapes or divots missing, as these substantially decrease the integrity of the arrow. Under no circumstances should an archer fire an arrow with visible external damage to any portion of the body.