National ammo shortage hits local law enforcement

When the King County Sheriff's Office canceled a recent rifle-training class for their deputies, it blamed a national ammunition shortage.

Soaring metal prices and combat overseas are forcing law-enforcement agencies across the nation to cut back on weapons-training courses and pay higher prices for bullets.

Bob Cecil, firearms training manager for the Washington State Criminal Justice Training Commission in Burien, said an ammunition delivery that should take seven weeks is taking more than eight months.

"We ran across this the first Gulf War," said Cecil, who trains more than 350 police officers annually statewide. "I anticipated this, and I built significant inventory. I started stockpiling. You just simply can't get the ammunition."

Cecil said his orders are delayed because the ammunition he's ordering isn't what the military is using. Manufacturers' priority is to fill military requests first.

Troops in Iraq and Afghanistan are firing more than 1 billion bullets a year during combat and training.

"There is at least a six-month backlog on rifle ammo, sometimes longer," said King County sheriff's spokesman John Urquhart.

In Trenton, N.J., a lack of available ammunition led the city to give up on plans to convert its force to .45-caliber handguns. In Oklahoma City, officers cannot qualify with AR-15 rifles because the department does not have enough .223-caliber ammunition.

Police say the .223-caliber rifle round is generally the hardest to find. Even though rounds used by the military are not exactly the same as those sold to police, they are made from the same metals and often using the same equipment.

In Indianapolis, police are considering using paintballs during a two-week training course as a way to conserve ammunition.

Cecil said police recruits at the state training academy use computer-based shooting simulators but said he has no plans to cut back on the time they spend on the shooting range.

"It's extremely important when I'm dealing with new recruits who have never shot bullets before. There's no substitute to live fire," he said.

While police across Western Washington say they haven't resorted to canceling training courses, they have experienced significant ammunition-delivery delays.

Federal Way police spokeswoman Stacy Flores said bullets ordered more than seven months ago still haven't been delivered.

Last year, it would take about two months for an ammunition delivery, she said.

"We are having to provide the folks we get our ammunition from greater lead times," said Everett police Sgt. Robert Goetz. "Historically we've given them 30 to 90 days, and now it's three to six months."

Departments across the state have taken to packing their ammunition- supply rooms to their fullest. Officials with Everett police, the FBI and even the King County Sheriff's Office say they reorder well before running low.

"It just means we have to plan better," Urquhart said. "You can get the ammunition, but the lead time is longer and we have to make allowances for that."

Police in Federal Way and Renton say the price of ammunition has nearly doubled over the last 12 months.

Cecil attributes this to the demand for components to make up ammunition, "copper for the jacket of bullet and brass which makes up cartridge case." As the price of copper, brass, nickel, steel and lead rise across the globe, ammunition manufacturers are feeling the pinch.

While Cecil is locked into a contract to guarantee the price he pays for ammunition now, he expects a "significant price increase" when his contract expires next year.

Ammunition manufacturers plan to increase production in reaction to the surging demand.

Alliant Techsystems, which runs the Lake City Army Ammunition Plant in Independence, Mo., directly supplies the military with more than 80 percent of its small-arms ammunition. Production at the factory has more than tripled since 2002, rising from roughly 425 million rounds that year to 1.4 billion rounds in 2006, according to the Joint Munitions Command at the Rock Island Arsenal in Illinois.

"We started running plants 24/7. Now we think it is long-term, so we're going to build more production capability," said Bryce Hallowell, spokesman for Alliant Techsystems.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Jennifer Sullivan: 206-464-8294 or jensullivan@seattletimes.com