How did your Unintentional Discharge happen?

[Texas Gun Person]

I have never had one, but I was almost directly in front of a revolver that was "unloaded" and had the trigger pulled. Friend played it off like it was no big deal... upset me just a bit.


Turned out the revolver was skipping chambers.

 

[GLOOB]

Learn to decock

There are quite a few votes for "decocking accident."

I see the way people decock a gun in the movies, and I hear about ND's with a 1911, or a revolver that has a transfer bar or other safety mechanism. So I know that some people just don't get that there are some safeties built into many modern guns which they are inadvertently bypassing.

The way I do it seems pretty safe. What do you think?

After pointing in a safe direction, I:

1. jam the tip of my thumb against back of the slide, between hammer and firing pin. I will never pinch the hammer between thumb/forefinger, because the only thing stopping the hammer from falling in that case is friction. The hook of my thumb holds the hammer back. But this is secondary to the first thought, of blocking the firing pin at any and all cost - even if it results in pinched skin.
2. put finger in trigger guard, and pull trigger
3. remove finger from trigger guard, because:

a. This engages the trigger safety, if the gun has one!
b. Holding the trigger and the hammer back at the same time is more complicated for my puny brain.
c. Index finger along the slide gives a better grip/leverage/control for the next part.

4. lower hammer, keeping thumb pinned to the back of the slide, and just sliding up and out of the way when necessary.
5. if there's a half cock notch, then I deal with it after it engages. I don't keep the trigger pulled all the way down, just because I'm too lazy to pull it again. A gun is less likely to ND from the half-cock notch.

I do not practice this to make it smooth and automatic. I think about each step as I go, every time I do it, whether I know the gun to be loaded or not. If I can't give this process my full attention, then I'm better off leaving it cocked. Manually decocking a gun requires you to violate one of the most basic and important of gun safety rules. It should never become automatic, IMO.

 

[billdeserthills]

None of the above (below?)

I call it a Negligent Discharge and it was My Fault, the firing pin had rusted while in the fired position. When I chambered a 22LR round the gun immediately fired without a trigger pull. Fortunately even though I was wasted, I had been pointing the gun towards the wall, nobody was hurt, and now I can be more careful every moment of every DAY

 

[RC45]

Interesting read.

I was taught a few precautions by my father many many years ago.

1) never take ammunition with your weapon to the cleaning station.
2) always have an empty magazine in the cleaning kit for test loading/dry firing
3) have a handful of snapcaps and extra magazines on hand for when you want to practice/dry fire you so dont accidently grab live ammo around you.

The above when combined with the 4 Rules is how I hope to remain "it went off while cleaning/I thought it was unloaded" incident free for ever.

 

[twisted1600]

None yet.
My son had one two years ago.
Scared the iss out of me!!!!!


I don't own anything semi-auto so safety and caution....finger off trigger...... have been enough to prevent one.

 

[bob barker]

Wow, pretty good read here. I have been shooting for quite a while and have never had a ND or AD but thought this might be a good bump.

 

[dev_null]

Slamfire on 1898 Krag carbine, since fixed. Startled me, but muzzle was pointed downrange (and finger off the trigger) per basic safety rules.

 

[TechBrute]

Guess we still can't fix the necroposting noob issue...

 

[JohnKSa]

I actually keep up with the poll results as more people vote.

So far 441 people have voted on the poll reporting on 529 unintentional discharges. That's interesting because it suggests that people who have one unintentional discharge are fairly likely to have another. If we assume that multiple reporters each reported only 2 unintentional discharges, that would mean that 1 in 5 persons voting had 2 unintentional discharges. Realistically I don't have any way of telling how many unintentional discharges the multiple reporters had so it could be more than 2 each. That would make the probability of having multiple discharges given that you've already had one less than 1 in 5 but would increase the chances of having 2 additional unintentional discharges after already having had one.

74% of the unintentional discharges are clearly negligent.

26% of them could be classified as accidental since they involve parts breakage or defective firearms.

Of the negligent discharges, 47% of them occurred when someone INTENTIONALLY pulled the trigger.

Of the negligent discharges, 82% of them occurred with the shooter's finger on the trigger.

Rule 2 is VERY important. More than 80% of negligent discharges could be eliminated if people would keep their fingers off the trigger when not shooting.

 

[TechBrute]

John, thanks for that info. Hadn't considered the repeat offender angle.

Also, can you clarify what the 26% that wasn't considered "clearly negligent" is?

 

[doc2rn]

Techbrute said

Slamfire due to broken spring that holds firing pin to the rear on a Mark II. It was at a range and the gun was pointing downrange when I dropped the bolt.

+1 Edit to add: Finger was not on trigger, and how can a parts breakage durring use be considered accidental or negligent? Mechanical things such as tools do break with repeated use.

 

[The-Reaver]

Very Stupidly.

 

[JohnKSa]

Clearly negligent discharges involved discharges that obviously directly resulted from violations of the basic rules of firearm safety. Putting a finger on the trigger of a gun that the shooter does not intend to fire is an example of that.

Those that I classified as "not clearly negligent" involved parts breakage or other similar issues. Basically things that weren't the result of a violation of a basic rule of firearm safety. Having a trigger double or having a gun simply go off due to defective parts or parts breakage are examples of that.

Frankly, I tried to avoid the typical ND vs. AD argument by simply asking for the facts surrounding the discharge and calling them all UDs.

There are two main takeaways from the poll results in my opinion.

1. 3/4 of all the unintentional discharges reported obviously involve breaking a basic rule of firearm safety.

2. 8 out of 10 discharges that resulted from shooter error/safety rules violations were the result of violating the finger off the trigger unless you intend to shoot rule.

The practical application is that following rule 2 (keep your finger off the trigger unless you intend to shoot) will eliminate about 6 out of 10 unintentional discharges and about 8 out of 10 negligent discharges.

 

[Skribs]

I've never had one. I even tried once. Well, I was at the range, point the gun down range, and I shook it a bunch and smacked it on the table at all odd angles. It didn't fire. That's what made me comfortable carrying with a round in the chamber.

 

[GMcBoozer]

I was a hair's width away from one in the first week of my first pistol. The novelty factor got the better of me and I almost dry fired it. It was a DA/SA pistol, and I was about to squeeze the last of the DA pull to drop the hammer, and a little voice in the back of my head asked if I had a magazine in the firearm. I checked, and it was in there loaded, checked the chamber and there was a round in there too. That freaked me out real good. Glad to say I learned my lesson and I have a few extra rules in place along with the original 4 burned into my mind. I guess I kinda came out on top, learned the ND/AD lesson with out actually having a ND/AD. Hopefully I won't ever have one.

 

[hermannr]

I have had two weapons fire more than one time on one trigger pull and release (unintended FA fire)

The first and worst was a "grease gun" had been issued in Vietnam when I was "staff" (they were short on 45's) Shot it once. 40 rounds of 45 with one trigger pull (and release) it just kept firing until the mag was empty.

The second problem weapon was a used High Standard Trophy that would occationally fire twice with one trigger pull. took the gun apart and found someone had tried to file the sear and did not get it square..no idea why,,the Trophy has a fully adjustable trigger...anyway repaired and have had no more poblems with that weapon.

 

[Iramo94]

I got two.
First, when I was a little kid, I double tapped a 5906, one double action, the next one single action. Apparently I was working so hard to pull on that double digit weight first shot, that I pulled the second one without thinking.
More recently, I was behind a .308 Mossberg ATR with a trigger measured in ounces. (you can see where this one is going...) I was about to fire, finger in the trigger guard, when I realized the stock was too loose on my shoulder. I pulled it tighter in, and bang: a little hole appeared in the bull's eye. It was by far the least flinchy shot I have ever fired.

 

[SimplyChad]

ive had 2 one was a machanical error with the firearm. Almost took my nuts off. Bullet actually cut cloth on my pants went through the seat of my car the heel of my shoe and out the floor board. glad i took it out of the holster. The second was on me. I was at the house with my new revolver I was practicing cocking/decocing with it empty. Well I did that about a hundred time real gently then decided to load it and try a few. I went though the first 4 or 5 round without a problem then start whistling. Dog thought I was calling her jump over the back of the couch hit me thumb slipped. Killed House and my plasma screen. But i did find out that i could fire a 357 mag in the house and the neighbors not notice. I also found out what said round would do to a brick wall.



And on the first one I really thought I did it for a while. Even if it had a 12 pound pull but i just couldnt believe that it wasnt my error. Then about 3 nights later it was on the bed side table. (No Kids) and at about midnight BANG fired the gun turned and fired again before I could clear it. I will never own another striker fired pistol again.

 

[bob barker]

Guess we still can't fix the necroposting noob issue...

You welcome!

 

[tubeshooter]

I saw this thread and thought to myself "any enthusiast ought to take a moment and read some of this". I am glad I did; learned some situations to watch out for that I was not aware about or hadn't considered much.

I have had two. The first is from replacing a screw on a Model 60 .22 rifle, which made the trigger extremely light - to the point of not being safe. So it wasn't really an AD/ND, but sort of. More like "discharged a bit earlier than expected". I haven't fired it in about 15 years, and won't until it's fixed.

The second, I had a revolver that would lock up sometimes. About the third time it did it, I had the revolver in both hands, pointed in a safe direction, squeezing the trigger hard as I could. Bad idea... BANG! I got a little gas and blowback on my non-shooting hand (which was around the cylinder), but I'm lucky I didn't lose a finger. Got rid of that gun.


No problems since. Very careful now, and will continue to be. Have taught my daughter the same. Thanks to everyone for their contributions to this thread.

 

[drcook]

I bought a 2 stage trigger from DPMS for a rifle. After installation, it felt like a trigger that needed smoothed up. We took it to the range and it doubled. After that I immediately disabled the weapon as I knew then what felt like it needed smoothed was actually something wrong with it.

After subsequent disassembly and comparing to the other 2 stage triggers I noticed that the raw casting (yep DPMS 2 stage triggers are cast and actually look like the ones that come from another manufacturer) was not exactly straight.

Since the channel was curved just a little, the disconnector was not operating correctly. All it took to let it double was simply letting a little pressure off, NOT releasing it so the trigger would return to position to fire again, just a bare release of muscle tension.

DPMS replaced the trigger, no questions asked after I explained the problem.

I relate this story as much as I can so that other folks either don't have a bad accident or get slammed with the parts to make a "machine gun". I was at the gun range in a controlled environment so I had no resulting issues.

 

[HankB]

Was shooting another guy's HK4 (Heckler & Koch's crummy knock-off of the Mauser HSc) and the pistol would unexpectedly double and triple. Turned out the frame - welded sheet metal - was broken and the disconnector wasn't working right. Even in .22 rimfire the second and third rounds went really high.

 

[we are not amused]

I had one a few years back. I was attempting to pull the slide back on what I thought was an unloaded "broom handle Mauser. I did not have the hammer back in the locked position, and I let the slide slip. The hammer came back up with enough force to set off the round in the chamber.

Scared the bejesus out of me, but since the gun was pointed in a safe direction, no harm done.

I have no idea why I left the gun loaded from when I last fired it, It shouldn't have been. But it did make a believer out of me in the rule, "treat every gun as if it were loaded", because it just might be.

 

[MuleRyder]

I had one when I was about 21. I just brought home a Ruger Redhawk .44mag, and was dry firing it and checking out the action. I thought, I don't think the action is as smooth as my Colt Trooper MKV. I got out my Colt and stupidly didn't check to see if it was loaded, it was and I proceeded to put a round through my pillow and into the headboard of my bed where it lodged. I thank God it was a .38 target load and not full house .357 because people were on the other side of the wall and a.357 probably would have penetrated into the other room. I couldn't believe how bad it scared me. After that I double and triple check every firearm.

 

[JRH6856]

Once I simply let the hammer slip while de-cocking a Colt Police Positive .38. Fortunately, it was loaded with Speer plastic practice rounds. The second time was worse. 1911a1 loaded with Speer 200gr JHP flying ashtrays. My "rule" was, when I took the gun out of the holster in the house, I unloaded it so an unholstered gun was always unloaded. When I loaded it, I holstered it. I was just finishing dry-fire practice and reloaded, racked the slide and dropped the mag to top it off. Then the phone rang. I laid the gun and mag on the dresser and picked up the phone. When I hung up the phone, I picked up the gun and snapped a quick shot at the light switch...there was a loud noise and the lights went out. Took me a few minutes to figure out what happenned. The bullet destroyed the light switch and flattened against the back of the metal switch box (expansion was impressive but penetration wasn't). I had spare switches so I just replaced it and went to work. Never told anyone until now.

It can be dangerous to let rules become habits. I changed the "rule" from "unholstered gun is always unloaded" to "check the chamber/cylinder EVERY TIME I pick up a gun" That was 30 years ago and so far it's working...knock on wood.

Also, I do not hand a gun to anyone or allow anyone to hand me a gun unless the action is open and I can see it is unloaded. To paraphrase Fletcher in The Outlaw Josey Wales, "I don't want to hear gun empty, I want to see gun empty."