Scarry!

Insane hot-button for me here...at Bill's (of course...) I see the guys doing a pretty good job of expecting muzzle control while folks are fondling the hand-guns...HOWEVER...I am blown-away (forgive the pun) at how freely people take the hardware off the wall and sweep the whole damn shop like they are taking out Taliban! I see this often and have never observed anyone saying anything to these folks - on top of that, these weapons do not appear to be secured with any type of trigger or chamber lock??? I expect (and hope) to be corrected on the security of the weapons on the wall but we will see...sigh...

I'm on the same page, don't ever point a muzzle at me! I don't care how many times I or anyone else have verified it is empty. I don't care if the slide is locked back. There is never any reason to point a firearm at anyone/thing you aren't willing to shoot. At least that was what I was taught when I was 6,7,8, etc.

And some wonder why I will not voluntarily declare to an LEO if I am carrying, well the quote above is basically why. Now I will voluntarily declare if there is a chance that the LEO may see my carry weapon during a legal stop, but that is because I don't want him/her to do something even stupider.

Now I am going to clarify that I am not trying to slam all LEO's, it just seems that I have run into several of them that are not aware of their unsafe gun handling habits. If some would like me to explain my opinion, well we had better start another thread because there are a lot of examples that I could give.

Good idea! On your mark, get set, GO!

Muzzle Dis!

Please do. And not just because I agree with you, although I do.

OK, a few quick ones.

- At a match a off duty LEO was given a safety warning from a Safety Officer, but I did not see that one. Later in the match the same LEO turned with a loaded handgun and muzzled every shooter behind him, for which he was promptly disqualified.

- On a range one day an off duty LEO was shooting, bent over to pick up a magazine and while doing so, pointed a loaded handgun at people behind him. He did this by starting with the muzzle basically pointed at the ground and as he bent over, the muzzle rotated to the rear, which pointed it at some other people behind him on the range.

- An on duty LEO, or at least he was in full uniform and wearing body armor, tried very hard to shoot himself. He was shooting his backup weapon, which was either a Glock 26 or 27 and after reloading it, was putting it where he carried it, between his body armor and chest. Well it seemed that whatever held this Glock was hard to get the Glock back into and the LEO was jamming it up and down between his body armor and chest like he was trying to stuff dirty cloths into a laundry bag. I commented that I didn't think what he was doing was the safest thing to do, as I backed away from him, but he did a couple more stuffs into this area and finally made the Glock stay. I always wonder what would happen if the Glock had fired when it was between body armor and a persons chest.

- In a Minnesota permit class last year I had 4 young LEO's. I assume they maybe didn't agree with some of the safety comments I made and one of the LEO's told me that they are trained and are very safe in the handling of firearms. I commented that LEO's do think that they are safe when it comes to handling a firearm and don't even realize the unsafe things that they are doing. He still didn't agree, and the topic was dropped. Later at the range this same young LEO muzzled his weak side arm while reaching across with his weak side hand to pick up his box of ammo to load his firearm. I stopped him and pointed this out and he denied that he had done it. A few minutes later he did it again, but this time I wouldn't let it go, demonstrated with my hand what he had done and then then he got this kinds blank look on his face and didn't say a word. In both of these instances I believe the handgun to be empty, but empty guns kill people every year.

- I did not see this one happen, but was there and heard the exchange between the LEO and the Range Safety Officer. The LEO had apparently started to sweep the muzzle of his handgun in an unsafe direction. The SO was doing his job and stopped this from happening. When the SO explained to the LEO what he had done, the LEO disagreed and argued. One of the things that the LEO said was that he had carried a gun for XX amount of years and knew what he was doing.

- At an outdoor range a rookie LEO was pointing his handguns in 360 degrees as he walked around. I comment on this and asked that he keep them point down range, heck I would have been happy if he kept them pointed anywhere but at me. He showed me that they were empty, but that wasn't my point and I decided I had had enough and left the range.

Now what I am stating are facts, unsafe things that I have seen LEO's do and could come up with even more stories on non-LEO's. I apologize if some see this as LEO bashing, but it is not. I also know and shoot with several LEO's that are some of the safest people I know when it comes to handling a firearm.

I swear, aside from sheer stupidity, complacency is the next biggest cause of avoidable firearms accidents. We could ALL learn from this.

It seems to me that the longer someone has been shooting, unless they're constantly reminding themselves of safe behavior, the EASIER it is for complacency and "experience" to become confused and invite Mr. Murphy in to really ruin someone's day.

I trust an LEO to handle a firearm properly with the same level I have for any person to handle a firearm properly; that is not very much.