The NYPD is firing back at the NRA for saying it should auction off the thousands of guns it seizes on city streets. NY1 Criminal Justice Reporter Dean Meminger was the first to tell us about the city's latest plans for destroying the guns.

Hundreds of thousands of dollars in guns, headed to a fiery grave. The NYPD is arranging to melt down this pile of 2,000 illegal guns to the dismay of the National Rifle Association, which says the city should sell the weapons.

"Dean, why in the earth would we do that?" said NYPD Commissioner James O'Neill. "We went to a lot of hard work to get these guns of the streets."

Other police departments across the country do actually resell or auction off confiscated weapons —some as a result of state laws pushed by the NRA forbidding law enforcement agencies from destroying seized or surrendered guns. The NRA says the revenue raised could be used to pay for police training or equipment.

This pile could bring in a lot of dough.

However, the NYPD says saving lives is more important than making money and it does not want to take a chance of them ending up back on a city street.

"Each firearm to me represents a potential victim, a potential of a shooting or a murder," said NYPD Chief of Department Carlos Gomez.

Nearly 1,200 of these guns were involved in a felony.

Five hundred of them were surrendered in gun buybacks.

This vintage machine gun was seized in Queens. All being melted down, the metal recycled. Another thousand guns — assault weapons and rifles, not displayed — are scheduled to be destroyed in the near future.

"We try and do that twice a year and last year was roughly 7,000 guns," said NYPD Deputy Commissioner for Support Services Robert Martinez.

The NYPD recovered 14,000 guns in 2015. Many are still involved in cases and can't be destroyed yet. 

The department says it keeps all guns involved in murders, holding them as evidence.

As the NYPD gets ready to melt down all of these guns, the National Rifle Association says the department is being foolish.

"This is the end of the Iron Pipeline," Commissioner O'Neill said. "A matter of fact I have one final gun that I am going to put on the pile."