Earlier this week, a 9-year-old girl in Arizona accidentally killed her firing-range instructor when she couldn't control the recoil of an Uzi submachine gun, an act that has sparked safety debates across the country.

Gun-rights advocates say that teaching children about guns means they are less likely to think of them as toys and claim that a gun range is the safest place to learn about guns, according to an NPR report.

The opposite side of the aisle has questioned the necessity of public use of automatic weapons and especially their use by children.

Even some who favor gun rights have expressed exasperation that such a young girl was allowed to fire an automatic weapon.

"To allow a 9-year-old to shoot a weapon like that is absurd," said Adam Winkler, a UCLA law professor. "There's no reason that girl should have had that gun on her own" when she could not reasonably be expected to control it.

Winkler said that most states allow minors to shoot guns as long as they are under the supervision of an adult, though rules vary state to state over machine gun use.

Connecticut since 2008 has banned the use of machine guns by anyone under the age of 16, The Associated Press reported.

Despite the tragedy in Arizona this week, Winkler said it's not likely that the gun-range industry will adopt new safety standards.

"I would be surprised if the industry brings out new standards," he said. "There is great hesitancy by the industry to adopt national rules or standards. They think this stuff is best left to individual judgment."

Even with the inherent risks of firing ranges, accidents are rare. Sam Scarmardo, who owns the range where Monday's accident happened, said he's never had any problems prior to this one.

"In the last 14 years, we've probably had 100,000 people shoot five million rounds of ammunition, and of those, a thousand to two thousand of them were children," Scarmardo said. "We've never given out a Band-Aid -- no one's never even got a scratch."