Handle Every Gun as if it is Loaded

 Late one evening, (or early the next morning), about thirty years ago, I was helping my friends Lynn and Steve polish off a case of Natural Light beer in the basement of Lynn’s parents’ house. As is the case with most of the “lost nights” of my inebriated youth, I don’t remember what we talked about, but I do recall laughing a lot. That is, we laughed a lot—until the moment when Lynn calmly reached for one of his hunting rifles, aimed it squarely at Steve’s forehead, and without a moment’s hesitation, pulled the trigger.

Click.

In a span of about five seconds, Steve’s emotions changed from being happily oblivious to thoroughly terrified and to absolutely furious. As I watched the scene unfold from a few feet away, I, too, went from feeling completely mortified to utterly outraged.

“Relax,” an amused Lynn said as he revealed a small object he’d been holding in his hand. “I removed the firing pin.” Steve and I failed to see any humor in the stunt, and we proceeded to blast Lynn with a double-barrel of fury and revulsion until we took our leave of him.

A year or so later, Lynn and another member of our circle of friends named Wes went to a shooting range to test their marksmanship with a pair of handguns: a .22 caliber semi-automatic and a .44 magnum.

After they had emptied their clips, they walked downrange to retrieve their targets. About halfway there, Wes slipped in mud and fell backwards. As he hit the ground, his right index finger, along with the rest of his body, tensed up, and he unknowingly squeezed the pistol’s trigger.

BANG!

For a split second, Wes was frozen in fear, then he heard a sound much more shocking than the report of the weapon. The sound was Lynn’s pained voice. “You shot me!” Wes couldn’t believe his ears. He couldn’t believe he had just shot his friend.

“Ha, ha. Very funny,” Wes said nervously as he climbed to his feet.

 

“I’m not kidding! You shot me in the ass!” Lynn yelled. Wes desperately tried to convince himself it was just a bad joke. Afterall, Lynn had a reputation for making poorly-conceived gun jokes. Reluctantly, Wes looked as Lynn turned to show him that there were indeed two new holes in the seat of his pants.

In the following years, the two friends managed to find the dark humor in the situation. Lynn has never missed an opportunity to tell people, “Wes here once shot me in the ass.” The natural question most people then ask is, “Wes, why did you shoot Lynn in the ass?” To which Wes always answers, “Because I didn’t lead him enough.”

Of course, the real reason Wes shot Lynn was because he failed to make sure that the weapon he was carrying was actually empty. Although he checked his clip and saw that it was spent, he did not check the gun’s chamber. And while Lynn was fortunate to be hit in the posterior, rather than in the head, a vital organ, or a major blood vessel, he had been blessed with another crucial stroke of good luck that day. Prior to Wes’s turn with the .22, the gun that he was holding when he shot Lynn, Wes had been using the .44 magnum. Had he been holding the .44 when he slipped and accidently pulled the trigger, the more powerful weapon might have shattered Lynn’s pelvis or lacerated an artery. Lynn was indeed lucky that day. As lucky as anyone who has been shot can be.

I tell you these stories because of what they have in common with the recent tragedy that befell actor Alec Baldwin, cinematographer Halyna Hutchens, and director Joel Souza on the set of the film “Rust”. In that situation, an assistant director yelled “Cold gun!” when he handed a prop gun to Baldwin as they prepared to shoot a scene for the film. According to reports, Baldwin pointed the gun at Hutchens and, believing it to be safe and not loaded, pulled the trigger (perhaps by accident.) Hutchens died and Souza was hospitalized after being shot at close range. Inexplicably, the “cold” gun had been loaded with live ammunition. Whether this was a miscommunication, an oversight, or sabotage is under police investigation.

All three of these incidents could have been avoided had the people holding the weapons followed one very simple and critical rule: Handle every gun as if it is loaded.

Had Lynn treated his hunting rifle as if it were loaded, he would have never pointed it at Steve and pulled the trigger, scaring Steve and I half to death. Accidents happen, and in his intoxicated state, Lynn could have easily thought that he had removed the firing pin, even if he hadn’t.

Lynn himself would not have been shot had Wes handled his handgun as if it were loaded. Knowing Wes like I do, he would have never deliberately carried a loaded gun downrange through slippery mud with the safety off.

I don’t want to insinuate that Alec Baldwin is the person responsible for the death of his colleague. On movie sets, the armorer, the prop master, and an assistant director are in change of making sure that prop guns are prepared, inspected, and certified to be safe before handing them to an actor. When the assistant director yells “Cold gun” on a set, actors are not expected to do their own inspection prior to filming a scene. They are actors, not firearms safety specialists.

Furthermore, a “cold gun” should never be loaded—not even with blanks, much less with live rounds. Had Baldwin’s prop gun been handled as if it were loaded, the terrible tragedy might have been avoided.

Please protect yourself and those around you, handle every gun as if it is loaded.