Those guys often come from a team environment where a realistic threat is shoulder-fired ordnance. Their SOPs likely have a good reason in their context.Originally Posted by ASH556
Personally I don't put my carbine on safe during a reload. I get my finger out of the trigger guard, (I do the same when reloading a shotgun), but I don't engage the safety.
3/15/2016
I'm possibly talking out of my ass due to a complete lack of knowledge, but I would imagine that in a team environment, in the chaos of the situation, muzzle sweeping a friendly during a reload is a real enough possibility that engaging the safety just makes good sense.
I also know of a story from one of these "team" guys who is a close personal friend that involved a breaching shotgun being slung (apparently not on safe) that cost a dude his calf. I think we all agree to safe any long gun before slinging and transitioning, but loading, searching, etc where you still have primary control of the weapon is a different case. SOP's still get written, though to try and eliminate failures.
Food Court Apprentice
Semper Paratus certified AR15 armorer
As a general rule, whenever my Benelli/1301 defensive shotgun comes out of my hands, I clear the chamber, as it is so easy to do. You can remove the shell from the chamber or leave the shell base in the chamber and forward end out, which makes it very quick to put back into firing condition. Of course my use isn’t breaking down doors, it is for protection around bears.
Likes pretty much everything in every caliber.
This thread is very useful for me. I just went to the range for the first time ever with a shotgun (1301T) and felt really bad for rotating the shotgun upside down or keeping it right side up to reload without first engaging the safety. I did follow all other firearm safety rules, but since I'm new to the platform it just seemed like a big mistake.
Now with the added context of a carbine/Glock it doesn't make me feel so bad. I always keep my fingers away from the trigger unless I've acquired a target. Now that I think about it, the only weapons I've ever put on safe while performing a reload were belt-fed.
I think I'm in agreement that for my 1301 it's either cruiser condition, hot with safety on while slung across body (front), or empty with safety on.
If there's anything I'm missing here please feel free to chime in.
Everyone has their own threshold of acceptable risk, but I would NEVER clear a building with a shotgun off safe. Even on our shitty Mossberg 500s, the safety is easy enough to disengage that it's simply not worth it to me to save a fraction of a second of response time. Similarly with Benelli and Remington, the cross bolt safety is super easy to disengage with my trigger finger in register. Same thing with an AR - off target ON safe. No identified target is by definition OFF target.
YMMV, of course, and you gotta do you. And, I'm not wrong handed - I don't know how I'd run an 870 or Benelli with my left hand...
Wouldn't you just have the safety flipped to the left side?
Likes pretty much everything in every caliber.
Is that even possible? Never had to deal with it...
Lefty here.
You can either buy a left hand safety for an Remington 870 and install, or buy a complete LH trigger plate. The problem with either solution is that at a casual glance it won't be apparent to many that the safeties are configured for left-hand use.
At one point I had red stick on metal inventory tags with 'LEFT HAND SAFETY' on the right side of the receivers on shotguns I had converted, but I've since converted them back - my lefty daughter will never handle a shotgun as much as I will, and I decided it wasn't wise to imprint a lefty safety on her.
Last edited by DDTSGM; 05-19-2021 at 11:05 PM.
Actually, outside of safety manipulation, better. You are looking right at the ejection port, you can combat load with greater ease - if you are doing it in a tactical versus gamer manner.
Of course some of that might be that left-handed people are generally more intelligent and creative.
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