Orion Arms Employee Accidentally Shoots Self

[halfmileharry]

Because people are ignorant. They have not been taught and, more importantly, they have not learned.

Man is an undisciplined monkey with no inherent sense of order or "common sense". He must be taught.

As well, very few people as a percentage of the general population have been shot. Many have injured themselves with knives. Thus, people are terrified of knives, but have no idea how destructive gunfire is.

Ask any INGOer cop how many times they have had people curse or make obscene gestures when they have guns pointed at them. I was teaching the legal portion of a class at Wildcat Valley. I watched the class wave guns about like cheerleaders with pom-poms on the range. However, as I was waiting for my time, I opened my folding knife to cut open a tangelo. The knife made an audible click (Spyderco Endura II SS). Every. Single. Person in the class turned to look at the knife and some made audible monkey hoots.

Why were they waving guns around like pom poms but all expressed concern over a knife being opened behind them? Because they had all been cut by a knife (usually their own in the kitchen over a bagel), but few of them had shot themselves or seen others shot.

Why do they treat guns like things other than guns? Because they don't know any better. That is why the safety rules are so important. They give order out of chaos. They make undisciplined hooting monkeys that points guns at themselves into men handling dangerous machinery.

Some people just get too comfortable and being simple minded creatures will be the cause of their own destruction.

 

[BE Mike]

Looks like the employee at Orion was seated and trying to work on his pistol. Luckily the wounds were grazing type and he is or shortly will be back to work. Hopefully much wiser.

 

[SSGSAD]

Here is MY "slang" .....

1. Know WHAT you are shooting at .

2. Know WHERE you are shooting .

3. Know WHAT is BEHIND what and where you are shooting at .

4. Keep your booger hook, OFF the bang switch, UNTIL, you are READY to fire .


How'd I do, Kirk ?????

 

[Kirk Freeman]

There are many paths to Nirvana. What matters is that you desire to get there.

 

[BE Mike]

There are many paths to Nirvana. What matters is that you desire to get there.

I didn't know that this thread would turn out to be one on Buddhism.

 

[halfmileharry]

I didn't know that this thread would turn out to be one on Buddhism.

I'd make a terrible Buddhist.

 

[Gunaria]

 

[JAL]

Uh, no. It may be a black eye for that specific person. But it certainly isn't a "black eye" for anyone other than him.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^
This!

John

 

[JAL]

There are a number of specific methods by which the guy could have unintentionally installed a new orifice (belly button) in his body with his own pistol. The one dude who knows 100% for certain (hopefully he does by now), is the guy who shot himself. It's fortunate he will live to see the next sunrise, and probably quite a few more.

There is a general tendency for humans to think and believe: "It cannot (or will not) happen to ME!" and its corollary: "Bad fecal matter only happens to others because they're stupid." I saw this boundless optimism and sense of immortality in young soldiers under my command. In some ways it was like having an entire high school senior class with a handful of adults to maintain discipline and control. Consequences, however, tended to be a tad more severe when it came to disciplinary action. Appropriate incidents were used as teaching moments, whether disciplinary or otherwise: learn from what happened to number one; don't be number two, and here's how to prevent being number two.

After age, experience, loss of immortality at about the age of 30, and seeing enough Bad Fecal Matter happen to others piles up in the brain, one realizes rolling the dice often enough eventually turns up craps. Even so, the "It cannot (or will not) happen to me because I'm smarter, better skilled, or at least not as stupid", never completely goes away. Therein is the psychology of complacency behind how some of these incidents occur. It's not the one you see coming that gets you, it's the one you don't see. Unintentional Bad Fecal Matter doesn't just happen to idiots, imbeciles and morons. It's an equal opportunity probability greater than zero; nobody has 100% immunity.

I freely admit having a negligent discharge about 45 years ago. It's my only one, ever, and it's very fortunate I was following other procedures for safe handling in keeping the muzzle pointed in a safe direction. The only damage was a corner chipped off a piece of asbestos floor tile and a very shallow divot in the concrete under the tile, and probably my hearing suffering a little more degradation than it would have otherwise now. I had just unloaded a revolver completely, or so I thought, carefully counting all the rounds, until dry firing to test suspected issues with the action hit the cylinder chamber with a round still in it. Counted the cartridges again in disbelief as I was wondering how long before my hearing would start to return and there were five, not six on the desktop. It's some of the longest 30 seconds of slow motion disbelief and denial one can experience. That one incident gave me That Old Time Religion regarding rigorous firearms unloading procedures, keeping a safe muzzle direction at all times even if you know it's unloaded because you just unloaded it, the realization ND can happen in the blink of an eye, you will not see it coming, and nothing reverses the arrow of time.

It wasn't until decades later, when I was investigating human visual inspection procedures, and the root causes of defect escapes, that I realized I had seen what I had always seen before and had expected to see: six cartridges and six empty chambers (yep, I had inspected the cylinder chambers too). It's one of the reliability issues with human visual inspections. The lower the probability of defects occurring the inspection should find and contain, the higher the probability a defect, when it does occur, will escape detection. The human brain tends to see what it expects to see if it's continuously imprinted with what it should see. One must very consciously maintain a high vigilance against this phenomenon and it cannot be sustained for long periods.

When I read about incidents like this, not knowing anything else beyond a self-inflicted ND wound, my first thought is: but for the grace of God, there go I. My second thought is that it's a graphic reminder to maintain vigilance.

John

 

[halfmileharry]

I'd much rather learn from some dumb azz's screw up than my own stupid crap. I don't want to be the dumb azz.

 

[ATM]

I'd much rather learn from some dumb azz's screw up than my own stupid crap. I don't want to be the dumb azz.

Learn today - teach tomorrow.

Deconstruct the screw up to the simply held but dangerous fundamental deception that led to negligent reasoning, unsound decisions, dangerous actions.

Address it at the human level to address it at the cultural level.

Humans do not universally follow rules, they were designed to discover them for themselves and with each other.

We can only guide that process of learning by teaching.