# Shot Yourself? Accidents.



## Dignan (Jan 17, 2014)

Hi,

On my previous thread there was a mention that people shoot themselves "all the time".

I doubt it's the type who would frequent this type of forum but am curious anyway. I'd also like too open the thread to any gun related accidents, yours or whom ever's mental state, gun, location, maintenance of the weapon etc…

I suggest the topic as I could not find much in a search and a number of years back I read an article in Fine Woodworking that was a synopsis of shop injuries. Most if not all of the injuries were user error do to fatigue, poor maintanence/set-up of machine, improper use etc. None indicated using safe techniques with guards in tact having been injured. Most importantly most mentioned a sense of something wrong and proceeded. This usually the fatigue factor.

I learned a lot from that article and never had a shop or power tool injury. I can't tell you how many times I turned off the machine, walked away and came back and rechecked everything or left it till the next day.

I'd love to see a list of injuries from a pinch to a poke.

Thanks,

Dignan


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## AdamSmith (Dec 18, 2013)

When I was 14, 3 buddies and I went hunting with a 22-short single shot rifle, for rabbits and squirrels.

We only had 1 rifle among the 4 of us, so we took turns carrying it.

The players in this drama are Tony, Eddie, John and myself.

Tony, Eddie and I had already had our turns with the rifle, and we each had missed. Now it was John's turn, and he had the rifle.

After a long hike of not seeing any small game anywhere, which is not surprising since the other 3 of us had already shot up the woods, missing and making a lot of noise, we took a break and sat down in a circle. John lay the rifle down outside the circle and pointing away from us, no problem there.

After talking for awhile, and debating whether or not to go home, we decided to get going, at which time John grabbed the rifle and used it for leverage to get up with.

All of a sudden there was a shot, and Eddie who was sitting opposite John was writhing on the ground crying "I've been shot! I've been shot!" John had shot him while getting up with the rifle.

John must have disengaged the safety on the rifle inadvertently while gripping it, and the trigger must have been touched by something, either John's finger or else the brush along the ground. John was no rocket scientist in school, and although we had explained gun safety rules to him before, he said he knew it all already, having gone hunting with his dad and cousins before.

We got Eddie to a local hospital, where they checked him out, but left the 22-short bullet in his leg. It was wedged deep against the bone and would have required serious surgery to remove it. I don't know about the lead poisoning issues of leaving a lead bullet inside a leg. But that's what these country doctors in North Texas decided to do.

In hunter safety classes, they teach you that while hunting, the three most common types of shooting accidents are (1) loaded guns inside vehicles; (3) crossing fences or other barriers with a loaded gun in hand; and (2) swinging on game. They did not say anything about sitting in a circle though.

We were kids then, and pretty foolish. So childhood, lack of proper supervision, foolishness, lack of proper training, and a lapse of caution for the moment caused this accident.

I don't go hunting in groups of 4 anymore. One other person is the most I have ever had with me since then. And I don't team up with other hunters in the field either, since the unknown factor coupled with more shooters might drive the odds of an accidental shooting way up.

And none of us ever hung out with John anymore after that. We felt that he was too accident prone.

John discovered and started "dating" the half-Indian girl who lived on the block, and they spent most of their time together thereafter, and not with us. She was an exotic looking beauty -- a Cher look alike. They eventually got married and had kids too.

John still lives in that little town with his wife, working as the boss of a janitorial crew. Eddie is an expat and manufacturing plant manager in Mexico, fluent in English and Spanish. His parents are buried in that little town, and he goes back there to visit occasionally. Tony is a surgeon in Tulsa, where he was originally born. I stay in touch with Eddie, who tells me about the other two from time to time. Eddie and I are both on the high school reunion page, which is how we got back in touch after all these decades.


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## Ratpacker (Mar 7, 2013)

30 years ago...I did a great job on polishing the trigger on a Smith .41 Mag. Lessened the single action pull by a few pounds too.
Got distracted by my buddy's ---cute young sister, ( already had the revolver cocked; & aimed down-range) lowered the gun toward the ground, and nearly blew off a couple of toes ( my own) Shocking the hell out of all of us. The shot cratered the dirt...... 2'' away from my Addidas running shoes.
MISSED GETTING CHAUFFERED TO THE HOSPITAL ....WHEEW.


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## hammer1 (Oct 7, 2013)

Was messing around with my wifes new at the time, ruger SR9, lost my focus and put a 115 gr +P+, JHP into our 2nd floor bedroom floor. Through the floor and dead center into a 42 inch flat screen. Needless to say, I was quite frazzled, and tv poor.


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## rex (Jan 27, 2012)

Yep,it happens.While all NDs are bad,it's really bad when experienced gun people have them.

I had 2 in my life,close to 40 years around guns.

One is technically an ND but I don't count it,in a match I pulled the trigger a touch soon coming on the target.It was an IPSC target and I hit it,but just cought the outer edge and it just missed a D count.

The other was real and not only scared the crap out of me but I was deaf for a few minutes.Long story short I was practicing speed reloads and using the base of the block wall in the bedroom as a target.Well....I pulled the loaded mag out of my pocket.......and repetition set in.Boom,right in the damn wall.It's amazing how fast your hearing shuts down,I heard only a split second of the report and everything from then on was seriously muted for minutes.I'm glad it was only a 45 ACP because I took a blast from a 44 mag off a wall and it was seriously intense and painful.


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## bushrat (Jun 25, 2013)

Back in the early '70s I had purchased my first handgun, a S&W M-10 .38sp w/4" barrel. I had read that dry firing was good practice for trigger control and building muscle memory. After one such session of dry fire practice, I figured I had practiced enough for the evening, so I reloaded the revolver to keep by my bed and went to get a drink of water. When I came back (tried blaming fatigue, but stupidity works better) I thought to myself "maybe just a couple more times." Pointed the muzzle at the spot on the wall I had been using for a target and BLAMM!  Scared the pants off myself, and it took a couple hours for the ringing in my ears to stop. Fortunately, I didn't hit anything important, just put a nice hole in the wall and the back of a couch in the other room. Been very careful ever since. :mrgreen:


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## rex (Jan 27, 2012)

Ah,the ears ringing.It's been going on for so long I rarely even hear it.The few gun blasts didn't help but between my job,loud music,cars and bikes they've been ringing for decades.I only notice occasionally when it's total silence,which sure as hell isn't today with 6 heighth challenged rugrats running around (and today they are rugrats  ).


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## SouthernBoy (Jun 27, 2007)

Got my first centerfire gun in the form of a Ruger Blackhawk .357 Magnum with a 6 1/2" barrel in 1968. Sometime within the next year or two, I was shooting at some junk in the woods and a FMJ round failed to penetrate an old oxygen tank and bounced back to me, hitting my lower right left right on the flat part of the tibia. Yes it hurt and yes, it left a welt. Nothing broke and not blood, just a nice welt and bruise for my efforts.

In June 2010, a man with whom I worked at my last job was cleaning his 1911 at his kitchen table. The gun discharged and hit him somewhere in his body that resulted in a fatal wound. This is what I was told at the time with a woman who still worked there. She did say that he and his wife had been having some problems. Turns out the man only lived maybe six miles from my home. He was a nice man and now he's gone.


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## OGCJason (Nov 4, 2013)

Had several near misses from students which is why I reduced my class count from 20 down to four in recent years. 

Never actually shot anyone accidentally or witnessed an accidental one...


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## Gruesome (Apr 30, 2013)

I've got one, but I was a minor at the time so this goes on my juvenile record. I was at an outdoor "range" with my father, the real gun enthusiast in the family. I qualify "range" because it as an acre of field in front of a 400 foot hill in rural Kentucky, not any kind of forma range. So dad spends a couple of hours sighting in his rifles and whatever else he does while I read comic books (I was around 10 years old at the time,) and then it was time for some fun. He brought out some milk jugs filled with water ad put some ancient shot-up tin cans on a hump of dirt and let me go to town with a Ruger Mk 1 for a while. While I was plinking, he had been loading up some black powder cavalry pistol that was the size of my leg. He had me hold it and aim and told me all about it, even had me cock the hammer, all while having it aimed safely away from anything important. When I came time to let the hammer down (not shooting it, just lowering the hammer) I did what any other man would do I put my thumb on the hammer and pulled the trigger to release I, then let it fall gently back to rest. Only I wasn't a man yet and my 10-yar old thumb couldn't do the job. KABOOM! At least one of my safety rules as in place - never aim a gun at something you don't want to destroy - so all I did was make dent in the dirt a few feet away...and maybe a minor mess in my BVDs. Dad was more restrained than I expected in reading me the riot act, but I think the lac of injury had him feeling grateful.

My father had two that I know of - I still have the blanket chest with a .25 caliber gouge from a Beretta, and the other went into a cement wall in the basement.


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## HighlandLofts (Jan 7, 2014)

I've got a few from over the years, My older brothers are nine and ten years older then me, Back in 1961 my older brother was 13 and my other brother was 12. They were at an Uncle's farm (Upstate New York) and were going to go shoot woodchucks, they have an old bolt acation single-shot 22 rifle with the plunger you pull to cock the gun. They seen a woodchuck so my oldest brother cocked the gun, it went down it's hole so my oldest brother had a hold of the round knob and pulled the trigger to de-cock the gun and it sliped, the gun went off and shot my other brother in his big toe. 

About thirty years ago my cousin was out deer hunting in Upstate New York with two friends. They got to their hunting spot before day light. They were setting in his friends Ford pickup waiting for daylight. When it was time for them to get going to their stand they started getting things together, one of my cousins friends had a pump shotgun. He sat in the truck on the passenger side of the truck and decided to load his shotgun. He had the gun pointed up towards the top of the windshield, put four rifled slugs in the tub and cycled the action. He must of had his finger on the trigger and the shotgun went off, blowing a hole in the steel roof abot two inches above the windshield. My cousin and his friend that drove (who owned the truck) were PISSED. 

About twenty years ago I was deer hunting with two of my brothers in Pennsylvania, I had a Remmington 788 -243 caliber, another brother had a Remington 700 - 270 and my brother with the shot up toe had an old Savage 99 - 300 savage lever-action. It was the end of the day and we were walking down the road back to out trucks,I was on the left, my brother with the shot up toe with the Savage lever-action was in the center and another brother was on the right side. Me and my brother on the right side got our rifles unloaded rather quickly, My brother in the center was cycleing his lever gun to unload it so he was walking slower then we were.He was about ten maybe fifteen feet behind us and must of had his finger on the triger and the gun went off, the shot hit the gravel road right between me and my other brother. A very close call, ever since that incdent everyone in the hunting party unloads their gun while standing still. 

About twenty-five years ago out here in Washington State a friend was out deer hunting way out in the Blue Mountains, Their camp was about thirty miles back in the wood on Federal Land. They were back in the woods about five miles from their camd hunting.it got warm out and his friend was thirsty so they stopped at a small stream so he could get a drink of water from the stream.He had the old style Ruger Blackhawk 44 magnum revolver in a leather holster without a top strap to secure the gun into the holster. When he kneeled and bent over to get a drink his handgun slipped out of the holster , the hammer hit a rock and the gun went off, striking him in his right ass cheek and exited out his gut sack. My friend stuffed his teeshirt in the hole had to run back five miles to the camp, drive about thirty miles to a farm house to call for help. Had to wait for help to arrive so he could take them to where they had their camp set up. Then hike back in the five miles to where is friend was. How the hell he ever survived the ordeal, who knows. After this his friend never had anything to do with guns, if guns were brought up in a conversation he'd walk away. 


About twenty years ago I was on the way to one of my favoride deer hunting spots in Upstate New York with my oldest brother, We were going by a stone quarry where I hunt occasionally and there were three Italians parked there and were getting ready to go hunting.There were two on the passenger side and the other one the drove was out on the drivers side of a Jeep Wagoneer. We stopped to bull**** with them, and they proceeded to loar their guns aswe talked. The driver had a 30-30 lever-action and when he cycled the action to put a round into the chamber he must of had his finger on the trigger and shot the back tire of hos Jeep. He didn't have a spare tire so we gave him a ride down to a resturaunt about ten miles away so he could call his son to bring him a spare from his Jeep. 


Things happen and itis probably human error 99.9% of the time. 

I'm not sure what the percentage is from accidental discharge of close calls to pysical injury to death. 
I'd say close calls would be about 90%
Physical injury 7% 
and death about 3%

You never know, accidents happen everyday.


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## KeithC. (Dec 24, 2013)

A gentleman at our church killed his wife while shooting a clay pigeon. She stepped into the path of his swing. I don't know if he ever recovered from that.

I witnessed a near miss with a mini-14. The man had the gun pointed at his wife while he was taking it down, (he had just taken the clip out), and she challenged him, "is that thing loaded?". "No Baby" and then he pulled the trigger to reassure her. BOOM! The range master just stepped out of the way and let her deal with him and it was UGLY. She did not hit him but when she got through with him there was nothing left of him. I never saw him again.


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## KeithC. (Dec 24, 2013)

While we are on the subject, whenever I am at a public outdoor range and I look up at the awning, there are bullet holes everywhere! I have never witnessed one of these discharges and have always wondered how they did it and if it's even safe to be there. What is going on?


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## rex (Jan 27, 2012)

KeithC. said:


> While we are on the subject, whenever I am at a public outdoor range and I look up at the awning, there are bullet holes everywhere! I have never witnessed one of these discharges and have always wondered how they did it and if it's even safe to be there. What is going on?


Isn't it disturbing?Our local range has a Porta-Potty between the parking area and the firing line.Of course it's a little more ventilated by 22s,but some are going the wrong way from the firing line towards the main road out front.Then the power company put up huge steel poles for the main lines about 200yds or so behind the 100yd range,if you look through a scope at them they've taken lots of hits from idiots setting targets on top of the berms.The river (more like a stream up this far) winds behind the range and we were always getting complaints of bullets landing around the canoers.We weeded out most of the jerks years ago but there's still always a retart in the crowd.


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## Glock Doctor (Mar 14, 2011)

Dignan said:


> Hi,
> 
> On my previous thread there was a mention that people shoot themselves "all the time".
> 
> ...


Hey, Dig! Either stop pulling my leg, or I've got a toll bridge in Brooklyn that I'd be willing to sell you at a real good price. (This is a gun forum; and you're older than 15 and computer literate - Right!)


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## Dignan (Jan 17, 2014)

@glock

I'm doing most of my work on this forum from an Ipad with the Tapatalk app. The search may not be as good. My apologies if I gummed up the works with an oft repeated subject.

I understand real estate a good investment. Send me information about the bridge and I'll see if I can get an advance on my allowance next week 

Dignan


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