Complacency, Ohio instructor shoots a student in the arm...

[AngryRooster]

and what are these 4 rules?

You are kidding right?

 

[atvdave]

You are kidding right?

No.. I'm not... I do not follow the INGO bible that some INGO zombies do here. I just do what my Dad taught me many years ago about fire arm safety.

 

[Kirk Freeman]

The Four Rules were codified by Jeff Cooper at API.

There was originally one rule "all guns are always loaded." It was not enough so one rule became four.

From our fellow Hoosier that painted the first signs for the Four Rules at API:

Clint Smith on Gun Safety - YouTube

 

[AngryRooster]

No.. I'm not... I do not follow the INGO bible that some INGO zombies do. I just do what my Dad taught me many years ago about fire arm safety.

The 4 rules have nothing to do with some "INGO Bible".

If your father taught you to treat a gun like it is loaded, not to point it at anything you don't want to destroy, keep your finger off the trigger until you are ready to shoot, and be aware of what you are shooting and what is around and behind it then you have been taught the 4 rules.

If he taught you something else then I'd be interested in knowing what this better safety program consists of.

 

[atvdave]

Thanks for the video Kirk. And yes.... these "4 rules" have been being taught in my house for many.... many years now, and I would hope in other households as well.

 

[Tombs]

If only there were some way to verify if a revolver was loaded or not. You know, like looking at it. YOU CAN SEE THE CARTRIDGE IN THE CYLINDER.

Guess which one is loaded? Right, the one with visible cartridges in the cylinder. You can plainly see if there is a cartridge ready to be fired from behind the revolver, as you would while holding it, even without taking the time to do it right and open the cylinder to check all the holes.

Not to give you a hard time, cause I can't tell if you're joking or not...

This doesn't apply to most revolvers. On my 686SSR, it's fairly hard to see the rim of the rounds from behind the gun. On a gun with recessed chambers, I really don't see how you could tell.

Either way that doesn't matter. Guns should always be loaded with one in the pipe. The ones that aren't are the ones that cause mishaps.

 

[AM The Concrete Feat]

Wow, I'd better not let anyone else know that great minds thinks alike!! EXCELLENT point!!

 

[hornadylnl]

Clearing and checking your own gun is one thing. It's something entirely different when unknown persons and firearms are brought into the equation.

What's the first step in cleaning your guns. Unload them and make them safe. If I handed you a rifle and told you that I cleared it and wanted you to clean it for me but you didn't see me do it, what's the first thing you should do? The answer is not (A) point it back at me, (B) run a cleaning rod down the barrel, (C) pull the trigger.

Should be common sense. I don't have a fear of my own guns that I've cleared, I don't have a fear about guns that aren't being fondled and sitting on a shelf. The only guns I actually FEAR are those that have been pointed at me in either anger or negligence. A healthy dose or respect is in order all other times though.

All guns are always loaded!!!!!1!!!!!!!!!!!111!!!!!!

You see where I'm going with this yet?

 

[hornadylnl]

Post a picture like this one and you'll have the 4 rules anti pointing crowd running around the conference room table waving their arms.

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-5YXjD-98D...+mirror+dr+heckle+funny+wtf+stupid+people.jpg

That crowd never allows for the fact that this guy checked and cleared that gun. It is always loaded. So how can we ever coonfinger our own guns? The absolutist rhetoric gets old because we all know everyone who owns a gun violates it. But some of us come to the gun forms to boost our gun cred I guess.

 

[Kirk Freeman]

So how can we ever coonfinger our own guns?

Because we have sand barrels.

As Cooper explained, an exception to Rule #1 is the weapon that you have verified as unloaded for cleaning and repair but once you set it down it becomes loaded again.

Regardless this article is important as it show that we need to be paranoid, at all times. It only takes once for us to create a bad rep for everyone.

Gun safety in the culture is becoming better and better but it never hurts to remind us all just what can happen.

 

[churchmouse]

I was looking at a 1911 in LGS yesterday. I was handed the piece without it being cleared. I pointed it down and checked for myself. I was asked what I was doing....it was not loaded!!!!!!


I answered "Yes, it is empty....now"

 

[Kirk Freeman]

Did you show him JetGirl's ammo jar?

 

[churchmouse]

Did you show him JetGirl's ammo jar?

No, that reference was not readily available but just being asked what I was doing.....really.

 

[hornadylnl]

Because we have sand barrels.

As Cooper explained, an exception to Rule #1 is the weapon that you have verified as unloaded for cleaning and repair but once you set it down it becomes loaded again.

Regardless this article is important as it show that we need to be paranoid, at all times. It only takes once for us to create a bad rep for everyone.

Gun safety in the culture is becoming better and better but it never hurts to remind us all just what can happen.

To read the regular posts here, I could take the bolt out of a Remington 700 and lock it deep in a vault in NORAD, the firing mechanism in Ft Knox and the rifle on my bench in Indiana is still loaded.

Nobody is advocating unsafe practices. The anti pointing and it's always loaded crowd always takes it to the absurd so that when any newb or anti reading this stuff must think that all guns are just ready to jump up and start mowing down school children.

What's is the point of carping on every gun is always loaded when you know it's an impossible standard?

Are we seriously scared of a guy wearing a shoulder holster with the gun positioned horizontally? Are there little tiny gremlins hiding inside the holster that will pull the trigger?

 

[Kirk Freeman]

What's is the point of carping on every gun is always loaded when you know it's an impossible standard?

Tis a fair question. IMHO, it is a reminder, so much so that it is Rule #1 (and at one time the only rule). It is a default rule as in computers. Or, a presumption as in the law.

What's is the point of carping on every gun is always loaded when you know it's an impossible standard?

Are there little tiny gremlins hiding inside the holster that will pull the trigger?

You want ME to answer that? You know I have examples of that happening.

 

[Purdue Plinker]

To read the regular posts here, I could take the bolt out of a Remington 700 and lock it deep in a vault in NORAD, the firing mechanism in Ft Knox and the rifle on my bench in Indiana is still loaded.

Nobody is advocating unsafe practices. The anti pointing and it's always loaded crowd always takes it to the absurd so that when any newb or anti reading this stuff must think that all guns are just ready to jump up and start mowing down school children.

What's is the point of carping on every gun is always loaded when you know it's an impossible standard?

Are we seriously scared of a guy wearing a shoulder holster with the gun positioned horizontally? Are there little tiny gremlins hiding inside the holster that will pull the trigger?

As ridiculous as you perceive posts, do you not realize how ridiculous your arguments have been? Or simply choosing to ignore the mention that it is different when clearing your own gun versus coming to a gun that is of unknown condition.

If you are not advocating unsafe practices, then why are you criticizing the observance of the 4 rules which would have clearly prevented the incident at hand? Until culture is ingrained with good and safe practices, then people should repeat them - albeit to the annoyance of you perhaps. Kirk and Cooper have both said that the first rule does not apply if you yourself have cleared the gun and are actively cleaning or working on it.

Of all the accidental self-inflicted GSWs I've seen, they've all been with semi-autos. #1 cause is dropping the magazine but not clearing the chamber and then pulling the trigger (often as part of the process to break the weapon down for cleaning). #2 is playing with it. Thumbing the hammer and letting it drop, spinning it cowboy style (yes, seriously), etc.

Until safety instructors obey their own rules and don't shoot students accidentally or owners prevent themselves from accidental gunshot wounds, then it's not hurting anyone to repeat the 4 rules and might avoid problems and minimize the odds. As paranoid as the 4 rules may be to you and your fear that the proper respect for guns may give ammunition for the anti-gun crowd to use against ownership... the outcomes of poor gun handling / ignorance of the 4 rules give them much, much more fuel for their fire.

The alternative headline could have been "Paranoid safety instructor properly clears gun he swore was empty already and doesn't shoot student." I really don't think that would have encouraged the anti crowd more that guns are dangerous and should be trusted in our hands than the actual result.

 

[Kirk Freeman]

There are entire anti-gun blogs devoted to these incidents. Observance of the Four Rules would prevent them.

I know it sounds repetitive but I see no other way to ensure that we all, including me, ingrain them into our character. It's not the odds, it's the stakes.

 

[Dirtebiker]

I was looking at a 1911 in LGS yesterday. I was handed the piece without it being cleared. I pointed it down and checked for myself. I was asked what I was doing....it was not loaded!!!!!!


I answered "Yes, it is empty....now"

The clerk really didn't know what you were doing? Looks like someone who shouldn't be behind the counter!

 

[hornadylnl]

As ridiculous as you perceive posts, do you not realize how ridiculous your arguments have been? Or simply choosing to ignore the mention that it is different when clearing your own gun versus coming to a gun that is of unknown condition.

If you are not advocating unsafe practices, then why are you criticizing the observance of the 4 rules which would have clearly prevented the incident at hand? Until culture is ingrained with good and safe practices, then people should repeat them - albeit to the annoyance of you perhaps. Kirk and Cooper have both said that the first rule does not apply if you yourself have cleared the gun and are actively cleaning or working on it.



Until safety instructors obey their own rules and don't shoot students accidentally or owners prevent themselves from accidental gunshot wounds, then it's not hurting anyone to repeat the 4 rules and might avoid problems and minimize the odds. As paranoid as the 4 rules may be to you and your fear that the proper respect for guns may give ammunition for the anti-gun crowd to use against ownership... the outcomes of poor gun handling / ignorance of the 4 rules give them much, much more fuel for their fire.

The alternative headline could have been "Paranoid safety instructor properly clears gun he swore was empty already and doesn't shoot student." I really don't think that would have encouraged the anti crowd more that guns are dangerous and should be trusted in our hands than the actual result.

So you're at the firing line and a cease fire is called to go down range to inspect targets. Do you personally ensure that every gun on that line is clear before you go down range?

I understand the rules and I don't disagree with them. But it helps to teach them in a way that's practical. If I were a newb and read these posts here, I'd be scared to death to touch a gun.

I work in industrial maintenance. Have you ever heard of Lock Out Tag Out? We have people sitting in offices who don't know the difference between a volt and an amp telling us how to safely lock out a piece of equipment with a plastic bodied lock that a "5 year old girl" could break off. If we followed the advice of the blissninnies, every single employee here would be in a bubble suit in a padded room sleeping for 8 hours because its the only way we could do our jobs safely.

These posts here are teaching an impossible goal. This firearms instructor was negligent. If handling of firearms is so damned dangerous then why don't we just beat them all into plow shares so that no one gets hurt?

I don't know how my wife manages to work in the kitchen with all those guns pointing at here from the basement.

 

[Purdue Plinker]

So you're at the firing line and a cease fire is called to go down range to inspect targets. Do you personally ensure that every gun on that line is clear before you go down range?

I understand the rules and I don't disagree with them. But it helps to teach them in a way that's practical. If I were a newb and read these posts here, I'd be scared to death to touch a gun.

I work in industrial maintenance. Have you ever heard of Lock Out Tag Out? We have people sitting in offices who don't know the difference between a volt and an amp telling us how to safely lock out a piece of equipment with a plastic bodied lock that a "5 year old girl" could break off. If we followed the advice of the blissninnies, every single employee here would be in a bubble suit in a padded room sleeping for 8 hours because its the only way we could do our jobs safely.

These posts here are teaching an impossible goal. This firearms instructor was negligent. If handling of firearms is so damned dangerous then why don't we just beat them all into plow shares so that no one gets hurt?

I don't know how my wife manages to work in the kitchen with all those guns pointing at here from the basement.

The Range Safety Officers check each and every gun, after each shooter does the same prior to them checking. I wouldn't just walk in front of a gun I assumed to be empty without them doing so. They don't assume every shooter is 100% perfect at properly clearing their gun. Sure, it takes a few second to double-check, but as Kirk has repeated - it's the stakes not the odds.

Yes, I've worked at a plant with Lock-Out, Tag-Out. It doesn't matter really that a 5 year old could break the lock off or not. It is meant to be a physical warning that the machine should not be re-energized until maintenance is done with it. For someone to disregard the procedure and rip off the lock and turn the machine back on would be moronic. You can't cure stupid, you can simply try to control for it as possible and prevent negative outcomes. The answer is not disregarding EHS/HSE protocol because it is impossible to completely eliminate Reportables.

Just because it may be impossible to keep idiots from accidentally shooting themselves, you think it is stupid to attempt to repeat the 4 rules to attempt to reduce the number?