The “FTF Drill” and hang fires?

[DogBonz]

OK, so I’m at a range this weekend that I have never been to, and there are a few police officers having target practice. My friend and I were sharing a lane because it was very busy. I was done loading my mags, and waiting for my turn to shoot, when one of the policemen had a FTF. With out hesitation, he executes a perfect FTF drill. I watch as, what looks very much to me as a live round hits the floor. I assume it was live because when he had finished that mag, he and his buddy examined it and then pit it in the safety can thing for ammo that misfired. (it is a heavy steel trap thing).
That got me thinking. What if that was a hang fire instead of a dud? What if that round had gone off in mid air or on the ground. How much damage could that do. From what I can tell, it was a 40 S&W being fired out of a Glock.

 

[BsChoy]

Hang fires do not matter as in my experience in thousands of rounds no hang fires have occurred in my presence or to me. "You train like your life depends on it". Everyone reverts to training and in the event of an FTF on the street you need to revert to the tap, rack, assess that your training covers and that is why we train. Muscle memory is the most important thing to have.

 

[WayneConrad]

You trade off risks, like any thinking person.

What do you think is more likely to kill you? A hangfire at the range, or a malfunction when you're having a Very Bad Day. That fellow believes it's the latter, so he accepts the risk of ejecting a hangfire when he's training in order to be better prepared for what he thinks is the greater risk.

 

[geekWithA.45]

Hangfires have been documented, but they are astronomically rare, much more so than FTF by a huge margin.

An ejected hangfire will detonate with as much force as a similiarly sized firecracker, or as a round tossed into a fire to cook off. As there is no chamber or barrel to provide pressure or direction, the round will not attain much velocity. It's a mildly dangerous phenomenon, but not nearly as dangerous as a round discharged through chamber and barrel.

IMO, the practice of ignoring the possibility of hangfire in combat shooting is the right call.

 

[brickeyee]

Pieces of the brass case are more dangerous than the bullet.
being the lighter of the two pieces, the case can split and fly with decent enough speed to harm exposed flesh, and a small piece might have enough to go through light clothing.
It is far more importaant to exectute the drill and get back into action than worry about an unconfined round going off.

 

[vynx]

I remember a demostration I saw at an NRA saftey class.

The put a cartridge on a bunson burner (like they have in highschool science class) and covered it with a cardboard box & then lit the burner - the brass shrapnel stuck in the cardboard but none of it went threw. The bullet didn't go threw either.

The biggest danger would probably be to your eyes.

I wouldn't worry about it chances are better of having an alien spaceshi[p crash into your bedroom when you are sleeping!

 

[romma]

I would think you would want to train for this scenerio without regard for a hangfire... Mr Badguy won't wait for you to wait the appropriate time limit for a hangfire...

 

[Pilgrim]

I am glad the officer was trained to instantly respond to the problem in an appropriate way. I've seen too many academy trained officers whose first instinct when there is a problem is raise their hand and wait for a range officer to come fix their problem.

Pilgrim

 

[fecmech]

Has anyone ever personally witnessed a "hangfire" with a smokeless powder cartridge firearm?? I have been shooting and reloading continuously since the late 60's, attending many matches etc and including pistol, rifle and shotgun and never seen one. In that time I've fired well over 200k rds. I'm not saying they can't happen but I think they are a throw back to black powder days with flintlock ignition systems.

 

[Whatsit]

Yes - in surplus .303 brit (cordite) 1947 vintage

 

[DogBonz]

Thanks

I wasn’t ridiculing the officer, I was just asking if it was dangerous. I know that you should train like you fight, and I know how important muscle memory is, but it was a crowded Sunday at an indoor range (not a police facility) with a lot of people in an enclosed space ( I don’t know if that would matter), so it did concern me a bit. In basic safety classes, every instructor that I have seen has said if you have a misfire, give it a good 10 Mississippi count while keeping the muzzle in a safe direction, before clearing the defective round.

 

[Larry Ashcraft]

Has anyone ever personally witnessed a "hangfire" with a smokeless powder cartridge firearm??

Yes. I had three or four in one day, hunting pronghorn with my 25-06. They included both handloads and factory loads. Doesn't do much for a guy's confidence.

Inspection by a gunsmith after I got back revealed a part of the stock that swelled slightly in the heat and was holding the cocking knob back for a second or two (this was a custom built 1903 Springfield).

So they were technically hangfires, but they were caused by a faulty firearm rather than faulty ammunition.

 

[c_yeager]

An ejected hangfire will detonate with as much force as a similiarly sized firecracker, or as a round tossed into a fire to cook off. As there is no chamber or barrel to provide pressure or direction, the round will not attain much velocity. It's a mildly dangerous phenomenon, but not nearly as dangerous as a round discharged through chamber and barrel.

Well, there is that moment when clearing a failure where the breach is unlocked but the round is still at least partly in the chamber, should a cartridge detonate at that moment it could have nasty results.

 

[distra]

I just finished RSO class yesterday and we discussed all kinds of malfunctions. Hang fires are much more common and dangerous in black powder rifles than modern catridges. If you do eject one, most likely it would go off like others have posted. In a combat or defensive situation, you won't worry about it and you should train accordingly. Most FTF are either light primer strike or bad primers.

 

[geekWithA.45]

c_yeager: yeah, that'd pretty much be the max bad case. I didn't say I'd want a firecracker in my hand when it went off.

 

[648E]

I had a hangfire the other day with my Winchester 94-22.

Using Remington ammo (fairly new). I heard the hammer fall as if I was dry firing the rifle and a fraction of a second later the round went off. It is a strange thing to see for sure.

 

[Handgun Midas]

Yes - in surplus .303 brit (cordite) 1947 vintage

Oh crap.
My father has gobs of that stuff and the MkII is under my bed.

 

[dfaugh]

Has anyone ever personally witnessed a "hangfire" with a smokeless powder cartridge firearm??

Yes, I've actually had a handful over the past few years....

CLICK (pause) BANG! the pause was brief, but it was there, and a bit unnerving. A couple were in my .22, and a few in milsurps, all ammo related, as they functioned fine w/ different ammo (or even more of the same ammo). But, because of that I DO hesitate to open the action for a few seconds, after a misfire---but we're talking rifles on the range here, not in a defensive situation.