What Is The Most Dangerous Time For New Shooters, Mindset Changes Over Years

earlthegoat2 said:

Sobering but I was proud of myself in a certain way because I had still followed the rules and wold have still been safe but highly embarrassed.

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Almost "Barney Fifed it".... Thats why I always keep my bullet in my front shirt pocket.

don't know, and I plan to not find out

Palladan44 said:

The safety triangle applies here I believe. Borrowing from another industry, but same principle.

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-Sounds remarkably like the Rule of Threes:

"In any survival situation, a person may survive:

• three weeks without food,
• three days without water,
• three hours without shelter,
• three minutes without breathing,
• three seconds without thinking."

Handling a gun or being in the presence of others that are handling guns is a survival situation... .

Guys who’ve been doing it “a long time” yet are still fairly young. They tend to be cocky and do stupid crap.

The most dangerous thing for a new shooter is the "advice" that so called experts and so called professionals give to new shooters. Just because Becky's husband was a cop or dad was in the military doesn't make them a weapons expert.

I'm 64. I took a hunter's safety class when I was 12 and have been shooting ever since. However, I just joined a local shooting group (at my over-55 community), and one of the members was a range safety officer and firearms trainer in the military for 37 years. He recommended that ALL of us attend a safety class, no matter how many years of experience we had. He held it last week. I can't say I took away anything new, but it helped reinforce things I learned so long ago.

I've never been to a range, so I don't know about what happens there. I have seen first hand how some experienced and seasoned hunters throw safety out the window at the sight of a 90lb doe.

I work in aviation where safety is paramount.

I agree with those who say the most dangerous stage is when someone familiar enough to grow complacent.

In fact, the safety experts in my field constantly warn that complacency is the leading factor in human error.

theotherwaldo said:

I've always figured that the Gun Safety Bell Curve starts at Ignorance, goes through Conscientiousness and terminates at Complacency... .

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Very well put - but - why limit that to just guns &/or safety for that matter?
Isn't that true of everything in life?

The time at which they believe they know everything and are an expert. This is usually about 1/2 hr after thier first range session with thier new Glock or AR that they hadnt even thoroughly cleaned/learned to take down after buying.

Timeless said:

Basically it is always when they do not follow the basic 4 rules...which is usually a result of too much comfort/laziness.

My personal belief would be a weapon that requires trigger pull to disassemble and not following the rules.

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How many times does that new gun owner, who buys it 'just in case', along with a box of ammo..hears the '4 basic rules' from the retailer? I'm sure it's pretty obvious to the sales person, the person is brand new to guns. When I bought my first HG after many, many years of not having one, I'll bet the sale guy knew I was a brand new gun owner. I KNOW it's not the sales person's responsibility to do anything except take their money after a clean BGC BUT..
I think the new cadre of gun owners who buy it, then store it, 'just in case'..and maybe show it off to somebody are the most dangerous.

Great question OP. Not trying to muddy the waters, but I think the most dangerous time is continuous. I have only owned firearms for the past seven years, so I might still be in the conscientious zone (in my sixties now, so add in senior status too). Every time I handle them I realize, but am not fearful of, their potential to cause damage so I am very careful to avoid mishaps. However, no matter how aware or careful I am, I am also aware that I can make a mistake for whatever reason. Hope this makes sense.

Hartkopf said:

What do you believe to be the most dangerous time for a shooter to have an accident or do something careless? The first day? The first month? After a couple of years when comfort sets in? In the later years when the senses are not as sharp?

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Complacency breed contempt. When a shooter has a 'near miss' (pun intended) on safety from not following the Four Rules, that is when they become dangerous. BTDT. You might get away with violating one of the rules and avoiding an tragedy; I did and luckily only got a hole in my pants and the floor as a result. Could have been a lot worse.
I was trying to holster my 1911 in an unfamiliar hoster to me, when it was loaded. This was before CCW in WI, and I wanted to get used to that holster, and carrying the full weight of the 1911 with it. In my 20/20 hindsight, I should have put the unloaded pistol in the holster, and then slid a mag in, thus (almost) duplicating the carry weight. The one round wouldn't have made a difference. For those interested in the technical details, It was a King Tuk holster and while sliding the gun in, I had bumped the thumb safety off, then was depressing the grip safety attempting to slide the gun down in. The full roundness of my hips pushed the leather out enough that the molded plastic hit the trigger, and kaboom. I now physically push the thumb safety up while holstering.

Obviously when a person untrained and unfamiliar with a gun, made worse by a small amount of knowledge, handles a gun, bad things can happen. I got lucky there, too, as a 12 year old. Put a hole through the kitchen floor, and luckily didn't hit any of the 7-8 people in the basement, because of my ignorance of how a DA revolver worked. I resolved then and there to cure that by learning everything I could about every firearm I could, and started by reading Ian V. Hogg's boo on how firearms work. Been expanding my knowledge ever since, and I am nowhere near knowing everything.

Form my experiences over the years of instructing kids (4-H) and soldiers, (same things really, except they all become instant experts upon enlisting) If you get the Four Rules drilled into their minds right off, and keep reminding them (in 4-H we went over the Four Rules before every range session, and you military guys know (at least Army) you have to do a class every time you go to the range) they are less likely to get complacent.

Bennj said:

Great question OP. Not trying to muddy the waters, but I think the most dangerous time is continuous. I have only owned firearms for the past seven years, so I might still be in the conscientious zone (in my sixties now, so add in senior status too). Every time I handle them I realize, but am not fearful of, their potential to cause damage so I am very careful to avoid mishaps. However, no matter how aware or careful I am, I am also aware that I can make a mistake for whatever reason. Hope this makes sense.

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Keep that mindframe, and you'll probably never have an incident.

Competition is wonderful. In a well run match, you have a range officer enforcing safety procedures. And you get it every time, not like once off "training" and then you go your own way.

entropy said:

now physically push the thumb safety up while holstering

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I've never been taught how to properly holster a handgun. I use a DeSantis IWB, and remove the gun every time I put the holster on because I can't get my belt tight enough with the weight of the gun. When I holster it, it's thumb under the safety, other 4 fingers on the right side grip with about 1/2" of space between my hand and the grip safety.

My experience with most things is the people who think they know but don't are worse than the people who know they don't know. The ones who know but forget are somewhere in the middle.

Recently at an indoor range one of the shooters was putting away her firearm. She loaded 6 rounds in the revolver, placed it in the carry case and zipped it closed(almost). Probably don't have to
go much further; yes the weapon fell out of the unsecured case, fell on the floor, and yes discharged a 44 special round right into her thigh.
Been around revolvers for more than 60 years and have NEVER loaded that 6th chamber or the 5th in some cases; and I don't care if it's one of the new striker or hammerlock, whatever.
If there is not a round under the hammer/striker, whatever; chance of shooting yourself or someone else is not gonna happen.

Speaking from my own life experience, it's the time when young people believe that carrying a gun is a shield for being able to lead a dangerous lifestyle. "I can do stupid things in stupid places with stupid people, because if there is a problem, I can shoot my way out of it." Wrongo. 47 year-old me would smack 21 year-old me for some of the stunts I pulled.

I believe the most dangerous time varies between shooters of all experience levels. For some it's the day they bought a gun.

Howland937 said:

I've never been taught how to properly holster a handgun. I use a DeSantis IWB, and remove the gun every time I put the holster on because I can't get my belt tight enough with the weight of the gun. When I holster it, it's thumb under the safety, other 4 fingers on the right side grip with about 1/2" of space between my hand and the grip safety.

My experience with most things is the people who think they know but don't are worse than the people who know they don't know. The ones who know but forget are somewhere in the middle.

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With that Desantis IWB holster(I have the same ones for both my EDC guns), why not take the holster off, then slide gun in and then back on your belt??

What I do, BTW...YMMV, IMHO and all that.

FFGColorado said:

With that Desantis IWB holster(I have the same ones for both my EDC guns), why not take the holster off, then slide gun in and then back on your belt??

What I do, BTW...YMMV, IMHO and all that.

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I can do that with some pants, but my work pants have to be really tight so my only chance is tightening the belt with the holster already in. A larger issue may be the fact that I have to wear a "buckle-less" belt, which isn't the most stable gun belt but keeps me from scratching people's cars all to pieces.

HB said:

From what I’ve witnessed, most younger Hunter Ed trained/scholastic trap shooters are extremely safety conscious.

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^^^This is my experience too. I have helped teach Hunter Safety for years. Young kids and women are the best students because they are learning from scratch. Our state has a "born before" date to which you do not need Hunter Safety to get a hunting license. It's when those old codgers want to go out of state and need Hunter Safety to get a non-resident license where one sees just how unsafe those well experienced gun owners are. same is true for CWC. A Hunter Safety certificate is the cheapest and easiest way to get the "required" training to get your CCL in our state. Again, old codgers without any formal training before. They are the ones who argue about how to cross a fence or about how far a bullet/shot pattern will go. Complacency is another major factor. Young/new shooters still follow the rules because they want to be safe. The hunter who's been crossing fences for 40 years or climbing into his tree stand, tends to think sometimes the little extra effort to be safe is not needed.

I found that it's when people think there's nothing new to learn and they know everything already.

Indeed; that's why I keep learning. In my case, ignorance caused my first ND, and complacency, the second, as I mentioned in post #38.

From personal observation I can say it is when a younger man is instructing kids or non-shooters but he, himself, is not experienced enough to do it.

Personally, the most dangerous time was when I was a kid using guns unsupervised. It started out with supervision all the time, but as my buddies and I roamed the woods and briar patches in search of squirrels and rabbits, we got careless. We were carrying single shot .22s and 410s. Fortunately we never had a mishap, but the story could have gone the other way. All of us need reminders, kids especially and grown-ups too.