On Armed and Unready


In the Nov. 18, 1998 Washington Post article Armed and Unready, a shocking number of cases are described where "accidental discharges" occur, where blame is often directly or indirectly placed on the Glock pistol design. While the rate of "accidents" may correlate with the lack of presence of a "normal" safety, a call for a change in weapons fails to take into account the real problem: virtually every accidental discharge is actually negligence of fundamental safe firearms handling rules, and virtually every accidental shooting involves negligent violation of more than one of those rules.

Seeing that there is much discussion of safety yet little or no presentation of fundamental safety rules let me repeat these rules (in hopes that this letter be printed and more people learn basic safety) as defined by firearms grandmaster Jeff Cooper:

  1. All guns are always loaded.
  2. Never let the muzzle cover anything you are not prepared to destroy.
  3. Keep your finger off the trigger until your sights are on the target.
  4. Be sure of your target.
If these rules are followed, nobody will get hurt. Unfortunately, our society permits and even encourages ignorance of these safety rules. My firearms instructor, Massad Ayoob (mentioned in the article), has taught me and thousands of others a deep understanding and respect of these rules, and the importance of teaching them to others.

The claim "it just went off", repeatedly stated or implied in the article, is in fact a copout: the person's finger was on the trigger in violation of Rule 3, a dangerous act of negligence.

The claim that a normal safety would have prevented such "accidents" is ignorant on two counts. First, relying on a safety both re-enforces a mindset accepting frequent violations of Rule 3, and relies on a fallible mechanical device which may break or be misused, resulting in possible unjustified injury or death. Second, if a situation is so dangerous that someone (police or citizen) actually needs to point such a deadly weapon at another person, the situation dictates that the safety mechanism must be disengaged lest the weapon not fire when necessary to protect innocent life.

Rather than call for more mechanical solutions (trigger locks, various safeties, exotic user verification keys, etc.), everyone must learn, follow and respect the four rules of firearm safety. So-called accidental injuries or deaths only occur when someone negligently - either willfully or thru ignorance - violates at least two of the rules. Anyone - civilian or police - who does not know and follow these rules has no business touching a firearm.
 

Carl Donath