Another good idea is to put your target up immediately before dry fire practice, then taking it down prior to loading up.
That's why I use a dry fire target and not just a light switch or other permanent fixture when I practice.
Another good idea is to put your target up immediately before dry fire practice, then taking it down prior to loading up.
That's why I use a dry fire target and not just a light switch or other permanent fixture when I practice.
"For a moment he felt good about this. A moment or two later he felt bad about feeling good about it. Then he felt good about feeling bad about feeling good about it and, satisfied, drove on into the night."
-- Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy --
The first journeyman I worked under told me this story.
There was a Dad and Son who walked around the block every night after dinner.
Every evening they passed this one house and the dog would come storming out to the fence barking and growling.
The little boy would talk to the dog and calm him, then he would reach through the fence and pet him.
The father told the boy "Son don't pet that dog he bites." The son would just smile and say "He likes me Dad".
This happened every night for a long time till one evening the boy reached through the fence and the dog bit him.
The Father said, "I told you, that dog bites"
The story has a lot more meaning once you have been bit.
Never had an ND until this last year, I was about to work on a buddies Mossberg 500 that was having what he called “feeding problems”. So he clears it in his bedroom, brings it out to the living room, I clear it. Nothing in the gun, no rounds in the magazine tube after inspecting. I start to do a functions check on the gun, conducted one dry fire, racked the pump and went to dry fire it again, “BANG” blew a hole right through my buddies TV cabinet. I have been shot at and had less fear/adrenaline dump; it scared the hell out of me, totally unexpected. This shotgun had been checked by my buddy, by me, dry fired once and still by some act of god had a round in it.
Long story short, upon disassembly and parts check, the magazine spring was decompressed and was not pushing all the rounds forward. The weird part though is that I remember checking the magazine tube to see the follower before starting the function check, it looked like a orange colored follower, what it actually was, was a rusty round.
Nobody got hurt (besides my pride) thank god, and was able to replace the follower and magazine spring, which corrected the feeding issue. But damn that was a hard pill to swallow, not only having a ND but blowing the hole in the solid oak TV cabinet. You can never be too careful when clearing, inspecting, etc. Check, double check and then check again and hopefully it won’t happen to you. I know I thought it would never happen to me, it has defiantly made me take my time a little more on unloading and clearing weapons…
The second thing I did (after checking on my wife in an adjacent room, making sure the round stopped in the wall) - was getting on my knees and saying thank you God!!! How... COULD...this.....happen.....here? I'm making many typos cause my hands are still shaking. I, too, have been anal about rituals regarding dryfire. I observed all of them....except one, which should sound familiar to many here.
Sequence of events.....after finishing, I retrieved the live ammo and reloaded, my brain was distracted because my backstop was shifting. It's the only thing I can think of that caused me to forget to check the gun. I THOUGHT I had the shift fixed and decided to try "just one more." Of course, I also THOUGHT the gun was unloaded. I was not doing something new. I had practiced drawing from AIWB/kneeling before. I had sufficient backstop, the angle was ok. I'm really trying to dissect this in an effort to settle down please bear with me. Got on one knee, "shook out" my arms, and slomo began. Grip and draw were perfect, eyes on the target...bringing gun up to eye to target line....uh-oh, backstop is falling...while reaching for it with support hand, BOTH hands contract....one catches the all important frickin backstop...but the other hand/finger catches the trigger. Saw the smoke and muzzle flash, report sounded far away. A hole is visible about 12" below the crucifix hanging on the far wall. Rushed into the room where my wife is and things deteriorate rapidly.
Of all the things I've learned here, how could this happen?? Never even been close to this.,
My wife insisted (while trembling and crying)I lock gun up....which I do. Before anyone offers anything (and please, I need to hear from you folks, big time), keep in mind my gun ownership has always been "out of sight, out of mind.".
Can this be fixed?
Sounds like a sympathetic squeeze.Originally Posted by 11B10
Glad nobody was hurt.
Sounds sympathetic contraction. One hand squeezes suddenly (usually unexpectedly) and the other does so unconsciously.
Unless trigger finger discipline is hard wired in (and sometimes even when it is hardwired in) the principle of affordance means your finger will likely wind up on the trigger.
This is also why people are directed not to try and catch a dropped gun or to hold onto a gun if you trip or fall.
https://www.policeone.com/archive/ar...2h6XBiLr9Ie5j/
https://www.emerald.com/insight/cont...4683/full/html
An “affordance” refers to the possibility of an action on an object; Guns are designed to be shot. Therefore the optimal grip on a gun is designed for your finger to fall naturally on the trigger when you grip the gun. This is why trigger finger discipline requires conscious effort or training to a level of unconscious competence.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_De...veryday_Things
Lucky > Good.
Last edited by HCM; 03-24-2020 at 07:10 PM.
I think we’ve all got lucky at some point and only avoided something like this because of that luck. It can happen to anybody and it can be fixed.
I would always go into a different room to reload and be done dry firing no matter what.
What kind of gun were you using?
If I understand correctly, he had reloaded the gun, then forgot the gun was now loaded and decided to do one more rep of "dryfire" (a common scenario) with the now re-loaded gun which would have resulted in a negligent discharge due to not adhering to dry fire safety practices. But fate intervened and instead, he had a negligent discharge due to sympathetic response when he suddenly tried to catch / stop his dryfire backstop from falling with his support hand.
It seems out of the frying pan but into the fire. The "just one more" Dry fire ND is unfortunately a very common, and human story.
Doing dry fire and loading / unloading in separate rooms and putting up and taking down dry fire targets when done / prior to reloading are main fixes.
A backstop that will stop bullets if you mess up is another. Basements are good but uncommon in my area. I recommend my folks at work use their body armor as a safe backstop. Shooting your body armor accidentally is a "less bad" dear Chief memo that "how my bullet went through the wall and hit.... the neighbors house, my family member, etc."
Even with the body armor we recommend choosing exterior rather than interior walls for back stops. They are more heavily built and it reduces the odds of hitting a loved one in the house if something goes wrong.
Glad things ended ok. It happens to all of us or will. I have a separate gun dedicated to dry practice.
Dude, you seriously fucked up, and could have killed someone you love, or a random stranger. But you know this, so that’s good. Invest in training, planning, and equipment to make absolutely sure this never happens again. I don’t agree that an ND inside our house is something we can expect to happen eventually, but if we have layered safety procedures we can minimize risk.
A separate dryfire gun is a good idea. A Bluegun can be a good tool as well.
“There is no growth in the comfort zone.”--Jocko Willink
"You can never have too many knives." --Joe Ambercrombie
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