Utah lawmakers have passed a bill that would make it the only state to allow firing squads for carrying out a death penalty if there is a shortage of execution drugs-some even claim the firing squad death is more humane. The passage of the bill by the state Senate on Tuesday comes as states struggle to obtain lethal injection drugs amid a nationwide shortage. The bill's sponsor, Republican Rep. Paul Ray of Clearfield, touted the measure as being a more humane form of execution. Ray argued that a team of trained marksmen is faster and more humane than the drawn-out deaths that have occurred in botched lethal injections. Scroll down for video . is the past becoming the future? : This June 18, 2010, file photo shows the firing squad execution chamber at the Utah State Prison in Draper, Utah and may soon be put back in practice . The bill gives Utah options, he said. 'We would love to get the lethal injection worked out so we can continue with that but if not, now we have a backup plan,' Ray told The Associated Press. Before they are shot to death, inmates may have a last meal. In Utah the prisoners will not be allowed a final cigarette - as has historically been the custom before facing a firing squad. They may offer a final word right before their execution. Firing squad executions are usually executed by five or so police officers with .30-caliber Winchester rifles in rapid succession aimed at the chest. The prisoner is then hooded and over their heart is placed a small circular target. In one of the rifles is a blank bullet so each gunman can believe they were not the one who fired a fatal shot. The state has carried out three executions by firing squad since the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1976. Utah's last firing squad execution was that of murderer Ronnie Lee Gardner in 2010. He was pronounced dead just two minutes after the 12:15 am execution at 12:17 am. Opponents, however, said firing squads are a cruel holdover from the state's wild West days and will earn the state international condemnation. 'I think Utah took a giant step backward,' said Ralph Dellapiana, director of Utahns for Alternatives to the Death Penalty. He called firing squads 'a relic of a more barbaric past.' Dellapiana said the legislature should be discussing whether, not how, to execute citizens. Whether Ray's proposal will become law in the conservative Western state is unclear: Utah Governor Gary Herbert, a Republican, won't say if he'll sign the measure. His spokesman, Marty Carpenter, did issue a statement this week acknowledging that the method would give Utah a legitimate backup method if execution drugs are unavailable. Utah American Civil Liberties Union representative Anna Brower said the organization is still holding out hope that Herbert will not sign the bill. The legislation would make Utah 'look backwards and backwoods,' she said. The measure narrowly passed the House in February, where additional lawmakers had to be called in to break a tie vote. But it made it through the Senate on an 18-10 vote with no debate on Tuesday. Four Republicans joined Democrats in opposing the bill. Salt Lake City Democrat Gene Davis was the only one to speak. He said he was voting against the bill because it 'only puts another alternative on the table' instead of doing away with executions altogether. Ray said he didn't expect much debate on the proposal because it seemed many lawmakers had made up their mind about the idea from the start. More humane? : Republican  Paul Ray says the aim of his firing squad bill is to give Utah an option as states struggle to obtain lethal injection drugs amid a nationwide shortage and is actually more humane . A few were persuaded to support it once they learned Utah law already calls for the state to revert to the firing squad if a court ever declares lethal injection unconstitutional, he said. The legislation would reinstate the use of firing squads more than a decade after the state abandoned the practice. Utah is one of several states to seek out new forms of capital punishment after a botched Oklahoma lethal injection last year and one in Arizona that took nearly two hours for the condemned man to die. Legislation to allow firing squads has been introduced in Arkansas this year. In Wyoming, a measure to allow firing squads if the lethal drugs aren't available died. In Oklahoma, lawmakers are considering legislation that would allow the state to use nitrogen gas to execute inmates. Protest: Randy Gardner of Salt Lake City, the older brother of Ronnie Lee Gardner, the last inmate to be killed by firing squad in Utah in 2010, protests with a group opposed to capital punishment in January . Utah's proposal keeps lethal injection as the primary method of execution, but it allows for the state to use firing squads if the state cannot obtain lethal injection drugs. States across the country have struggled to keep up their drug inventories as European manufacturers have refused to sell the lethal concoctions to prisons and corrections departments because of their opposition to the death penalty. Texas' supply will be used up if the state goes forward with two lethal injections in the next two weeks. The Texas deadline is the most imminent, but other states are struggling, as well. The head of Utah's prison system has said the state does not have any lethal injection drugs on hand and would have to obtain some in the years ahead if an execution were to be scheduled. May not sign: Utah Gov. Gary Herbert  will not say if he'll sign a bill to bring back the firing squad but does say the method would give Utah a backup execution method . States turning to alternative drugs have been faced with legal challenges from inmates, something Ray has said Utah could sidestep if it has a backup execution plan in place. Utah lawmakers, concerned about intense media attention, stopped offering inmates the choice of a death by firing squad in 2004. A handful of inmates on Utah's death row were sentenced before the law changed and still have the option of going before a firing squad after their court appeals are exhausted. Utah's last execution was by a firing squad in 2010, when Ronnie Lee Gardner was executed by five police officers with .30-caliber Winchester rifles. Gardner ate his final meal on the Tuesday before his execution at 6:30 p.m. and elected to fast before his shooting. His last meal included steak, lobster, 7-Up, apple pie and vanilla ice cream at a cost of $35 to the state, corrections officials said. Gunshots: Utah State Prison (right) after Ronnie Lee Gardner (left) was executed by firing squad on Friday, June 18, 2010 in Draper Utah . Asked by a prison official if he wanted to say anything, Gardner responded simply: 'I do not, no.' Gardner was hooded and over his heart was placed a small circular target. In one of the rifles was placed a blank shot so no one would know who killed him. A barely audible countdown was interrupted by two loud bangs in quick succession. It was 12:15 a.m. He was pronounced dead at 12:17 a.m. The state has carried out three executions by firing squad since the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1976. The first U.S. inmate executed after that ruling was Gary Gilmore, who was killed by firing squad in early 1997. The Washington, D.C.-based Death Penalty Information Center, which opposes capital punishment, says a firing squad is not a foolproof execution method because the inmate could move or shooters could miss the heart, causing a slower, more painful death. One such case appears to have happened in Utah's territorial days back in 1879, when a firing squad missed Wallace Wilkerson's heart and it took him 27 minutes to die, according to newspaper accounts.
The passage of the bill by the state Senate on Tuesday comes as states struggle to obtain lethal injection drugs amid a nationwide shortage . The bill's sponsor, Republican Rep. Paul Ray of Clearfield, touted the measure as being a more humane form of execution . There have been several drawn-out deaths that have occurred in botched lethal injections . Ralph Dellapiana, director of Utahns for Alternatives to the Death Penalty called firing squads 'a relic of a more barbaric past'
Utah's last execution was by a firing squad in 2010, when Ronnie Lee Gardner was executed by five officers with .30-caliber Winchester rifles .