Accidental Discharge?

[rainbowbob]

HOUSTON (AP) - Police are trying to determine how a Houston kindergartener got a loaded gun that he brought to an elementary school, where officials say it accidentally fired when it fell from his pocket as he sat down for lunch, wounding himself and two other students.

http://www.komonews.com/news/national/120277104.html


Putting aside for the moment how a six-year-old got hold of a loaded firearm...

What handguns are still out there that fire accidentally when dropped (if that is what actually happened)?

 

[jad0110]

As far as handguns, pre-transitional S&W revolvers ~1945-48 and older do not have a positive hammer block, so they are not 100% drop safe. Neither are original Colt Single Action Army revolvers, or many of their modern replicas (Uberti and Heritage come to mind).

 

[Isaac-1]

Nothing says it is a new gun, it could be some 50+ year old saturday night special. Finding 50+ year old guns in night stands, etc is farily common when you consider the relative cost of guns today when even a cheap new hand gun cost more money than many people make in a week.

 

[NavyLCDR]

My brand new reproduction 1851 Navy C&B revolver will, if the hammer is resting on a capped and loaded cylinder.

Also, already being discussed here:
http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=588330

 

[joeq]

Any NAA mini revolver with the hammer over a live round and not in the safety notch could discharge if dropped. It doesn't really have to be an old gun, although that is more likely.

 

[NavyLCDR]

In all actuality, I don't know of any gun that will discharge when dropped. They seem to only discharge when they hit the ground.

 

[InkEd]

Three people harmed with one round sounds a bit fishy. I wonder if "ringing ears" is being counted as an injury? Still a serious situation but something sounds off to me.

 

[Effigy]

Clearly this is proof that guns should be outlawed. Please, think of the children.

 

[walker944]

New details in the story, as of 5 hours ago - the Houston Chronicle is reporting the handgun as a .380 caliber. The brand/model still not mentioned.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/7531077.html

 

[Ben86]

From the above story: "You really don't get a lot of guns that will go off if you drop them, particularly with a modern manufacturer," he said. "It'd be a lot more likely somebody tried to catch it or pick it up. I can't say what happened in this case."

My thoughts exactly. Either that, or it was a really old, cheap gun. Even modern cheap guns are made not to go off when dropped.

 

[Steve C]

People lie, kids lie any time they think they may get into more trouble if they don't. Adults brow beat kids into telling what they want to hear. News reports are essentially hearsay and not very reliable beyond the basic information that some kid brought a handgun to school, it discharged and 3 kids where injured. Sometimes news stories are pure fiction and all are rife with the reporters assumption, interpretations and point of view.

The gun may have discharged after being dropped but the more likely situation was it fired after the trigger was pulled rather than from hitting the floor.

 

[Jim K]

Most of those inexpensive auto pistols (Sterling, Bryco, Jennings, etc.) will fire if dropped hard as they are striker fired and have no firing pin block. If the sear is jarred out of the notch, the pistol fires. Better quality striker fired pistols (e.g., Glock) have a firing pin block that prevents firing unless the trigger is pulled.

Jim

 

[wally]

Follow-up reports here are saying it was a 9mm and the kid was trying to rack the slide and it fired as the slide went forward seems a classic case of not keeping the booger hook off the bang switch. No mechanical system can fix this. Seems he dropped the gun when it shot him in the foot, the reports of it firing when dropped were just mistaken from people hearing BANG and turning to see a pistol on the floor.

We may never actually know, a witch hunt is now it progress to blame the gun owner instead of the six year old thief (apparently it was a neighbor's gun).

 

[Dogguy]

I saw a later report stating that the gun was a Kel-Tech and the kid admitted he pulled the trigger "by accident" while showing off the gun to a friend.

 

[Cop Bob]

There Ya GO...!!!!!

BTW, I DID have a Post Transitional S&W go of on me, a late 70's - early 80's mfg M-19 6", Old style flap holster rolled back to vertical with the BBL pointed up, slipped out and hit the concrete hammer first... it defiantly went off !!!! After I changed pants.. I pulled the side plate and could see no defect and the hammer block was in place and functional.. I still can't explain that one...

 

[Kiln]

Though there are still modern pistols made that can fire when dropped like all Jimenez pistols and several of the Cobra lineup, it is still unlikely for these guns to go off when dropped. I kinda figured it was the kid's fault and its total BS if they do anything to the neighbor who's gun was stolen by the child in question.

 

[Sav .250]

2 part question. Finding out how how the kid got it in the first place should not be a problem.
Why it went off when it hit the floor. Should be just as easy. IMO.

 

[Kiln]

One of the posters above said that the kid later admitted after that the gun didn't go off when it was dropped but instead after he'd pulled the trigger while showing it off.

 

[TonyT]

Unless one knows the soecifics of the firearm in question it is impossible to make an accurate determination as to what really happened. I suspect that someone touched the trigger and then blamed the gun for discharging.

 

[aryfrosty]

Not an accident

That is NOT an accidental discharge. It is a NEGLIGENT discharge. As to what sort of weapon will fire if dropped...staying away from the semantics of the wording...almost any will given the cosmic allignment of certain circumstances. While this isn't absolute, finding guns that will fail a drop test is much easier if you look at the sort of people who will facilitate a six year old
getting ahold of a gun. They tend to buy and keep junk like Hi-Points, RG-10s, Phoenix Arms, Ravens and assorted other junkers. My wife and I raised five kids with no problems about guns. I was a cop all of that time and had guns. But they stayed locked in the safe and the kids all had the "Eddie Eagle" program info down pat. They knew that they wren't to touch guns unless with an adult and supervised. They knew to point them downrange and they damned sure knew not to play with them. They also had plenty of play guns and they knew the difference. Regards, Al

 

[Kiln]

As to what sort of weapon will fire if dropped...staying away from the semantics of the wording...almost any will given the cosmic allignment of certain circumstances. While this isn't absolute, finding guns that will fail a drop test is much easier if you look at the sort of people who will facilitate a six year old
getting ahold of a gun. They tend to buy and keep junk like Hi-Points, RG-10s, Phoenix Arms, Ravens and assorted other junkers. My wife and I raised five kids with no problems about guns. I was a cop all of that time and had guns. But they stayed locked in the safe and the kids all had the "Eddie Eagle" program info down pat. They knew that they wren't to touch guns unless with an adult and supervised. They knew to point them downrange and they damned sure knew not to play with them. They also had plenty of play guns and they knew the difference. Regards, Al

From what I understand the Hi Point pistols are drop safe due to some sort of internal weight system and I seriously doubt that the kid would've been able to carry something the size of a cordless drill into the school and not be noticed. Phoenix Arms pistols have an inertia based firing pin and are extremely unlikely to go off when dropped, its not even possible if the firing pin safety is on. The Raven may not be drop safe but I don't consider it junk, in fact mine has always worked great and despite dropping it with a round chambered twice since I've owned it the gun has never shot me in the ass.

Its unlikely that the gun went off when dropped, more likely that the kid pulled the trigger and blamed it on dropping the gun because he thought he'd get in less trouble. Don't be a gun snob, just because somebody buys a cheap gun doesn't mean that they're "the sort of people who will facilitate a six year old getting ahold of a gun."

 

[mgmorden]

From what I understand the Hi Point pistols are drop safe due to some sort of internal weight system and I seriously doubt that the kid would've been able to carry something the size of a cordless drill into the school and not be noticed

I know it's been a while since I was in kindergarten - but back then we had these new fanagled contraptions called "backpacks" that were big enough to hold just about any handgun you could imagine without drawing suspicion.

 

[Kiln]

I know it's been a while since I was in kindergarten - but back then we had these new fanagled contraptions called "backpacks" that were big enough to hold just about any handgun you could imagine without drawing suspicion.

You'll have to excuse me sometimes I forget that not all schools require mesh backpacks and random metal detector searches...the school I went to didn't allow any bags that weren't able to be easily seen through. If you were going to smuggle in a gun where I went it had to be small enough to pocket or else you'd have been caught for sure.

 

[Nushif]

the school I went to didn't allow any bags that weren't able to be easily seen through.

Dang.

I am *still* going to school and they don't require that kind of thing. Where was this, anyhow?

 

[Kiln]

Dang.

I am *still* going to school and they don't require that kind of thing. Where was this, anyhow?

In Arkansas which you wouldn't think would be so careful but there was a school shooting really close to my school at some point way back when nearby in Jonesboro and after that my school got extremely careful about the security of the students. The faculty was really paranoid all the time.

Once I carried an empty rifle shell casing to school and was showing it off to a couple of people there and I ended up being interrogated by police and having a parent teacher conference about it.