Preventable Tragedies - Training Accidents

[Paladin]

Preventable Tragedies - Training Accidents

Negligent shootings during training exercises seem to be more and more common recently, often resulting in needless deaths or crippling injuries. In every such case I have examined recently, the root cause was simple carelessness with firearms, or failure to follow the most elemental rules of gunhandling. Here are a couple of examples from earlier this year.

In one case, a SWAT team was practicing a rescue mission involving hostages on a city bus, held by an armed man. The officers were using their duty weapons, but all had been unloaded and inspected, and ammunition removed from the training area. A designated rifleman
(sniper) arrived late for the exercise, got his rifle from the trunk of his car, aimed in on the head of the police captain playing the role of hostage taker, and shot him stone dead.
This was NOT an accident—this was clearly a negligent homicide, and the officer was recently indicted for that crime. Here are some key points-
1. Be on time for training. You cannot afford to miss any briefing or other information, and ALL weapons need to be cleared and inspected at one time if role play is to be conducted.
2. All guns are always loaded. If you remove a rifle from your trunk, clear it. This is not someone else’s responsibility.
3. Don’t point your gun at anything you are not willing to destroy. Role play should ONLY be conducted with non-firing weapons, such as red guns, air soft guns, or Simunitions kit equipped guns, NOT live duty weapons.

In Case Two, an instructor was supervising simunitions exercises while wearing loaded real gun. He forgot, drew is pistol, and nailed a student right between the eyes, fatally. See 1-3 above.

The most recent case, which spurred this rant, involved a police academy trainee in Atlanta a couple of weeks ago. He was ¾ of the way through the academy, and was undergoing firearms and tactics training. When he got home one night, he couldn’t wait to show his girlfriend what he had learned that day. He removed the magazine from his Glock .40, aimed it at her chest, and pressed the trigger, killing her on the spot. Again, this was no accident, but a negligent killing. ALWAYS clear your gun properly before any administrative handling (cleaning, etc), which includes removing the round from the chamber and INSPECTING the chamber before considering the gun unloaded. Again, don’t point a real gun at a live person under anything but combat conditions. These events are completely preventable and are generally unforgivable.

http://www.rangemaster.com/newsletter/Aug2002News.PDF

[stroo]

These guys all forgot safety rule number 1.

[GlockenHammer]

These guys all forgot safety rule number 1.

That's the problem with the vast majority of accidents, and it's more than just rule #1 that was violated (on purpose) in these cases.

But perhaps the most important lesson is that it can happen to "experienced" people that know better. People like.....us. Never feel that you are too good or too expereinced to follow the rules or that you follow them intrinsically and thus don't have to consciously think about them. the ony real safety is the one between your ears, not that widget on your gun.

One instant of mental lapse can change your life....and end another.

[Liberty]

These guys all forgot safety rule number 1.

That's the problem with the vast majority of accidents, and it's more than just rule #1 that was violated (on purpose) in these cases.

But perhaps the most important lesson is that it can happen to "experienced" people that know better. People like.....us. Never feel that you are too good or too expereinced to follow the rules or that you follow them intrinsically and thus don't have to consciously think about them. the ony real safety is the one between your ears, not that widget on your gun.

One instant of mental lapse can change your life....and end another.

What is strange to me is that incidents are at formal training. If a person can't be safe during formal training how safe are they in real everyday life.

[stroo]

Agree. That's why it's good to read stories like these every few months. Helps to remind us that anyone can make a mistake if they don't follow the safety rules!

[GlockenHammer]

What is strange to me is that incidents are at formal training. If a person can't be safe during formal training how safe are they in real everyday life.

I contend that formal training is more hazardous than real life. Only in "training" do we intentionally point our weapons at people we do not intend to shoot and we intentionally pull our triggers. That leaves only one mistake--failing to ensure the weapon is unloaded--keeping us from tragedy, and that mistake is remote in time from the accident itself--it occurred (or didn't) at a time before the actual incident.

I have to agree with this point from the original post:

3. Don’t point your gun at anything you are not willing to destroy. Role play should ONLY be conducted with non-firing weapons, such as red guns, air soft guns, or Simunitions kit equipped guns, NOT live duty weapons.

I have a couple of the Blade Tech training barrelscoming for this very reason.