I've never personally experienced it, but the phenomenon of swearing you unloaded it but it still having a live round in there is why you always treat it as if it were loaded anyway in proper gun safety courses.
Luckily that is why no one was hit. He did treat it as if it were loaded and was pointed towards the bottom of a wall. Which is where the bullet hit. If he had it on a bed or pointed up at all my other roommate may have been going to the hospital that morning
The thing that always boggles my mind is that somehow people can do that and still end up missing a round in the magazine or chamber. Or at least think that they did it.
That's how I was taught to put a pistol away; remove the magazine, pull back the slide to eject any cartridge that was still in there, and check to make sure nothing was in the chamber. Finally and if possible, point it somewhere safe and pull the trigger.
When picking up a gun from storage that shouldn't be loaded, do all the steps except the last one.
I used to work a gun counter and our procedure was mag out, cycle slide, and lock it back every time it came out of the case or off the rack. Every single time. Doesn't matter that it's been in a locked case and I was probably the last person to touch it, and that is probably never been loaded since it left the factory (we didn't have an attached range or anything), we still did it every time. Also when we handed it to a customer so they could feel it, I'd usually point it down at the counter, spin it around and hand it to them where they can grab the grip but I control that it's still pointed at the counter or behind the counter until it's completely in their hand. We'd also clear it again once the customer handed it back before putting it away, even if I literally just watched them clear it. And of course make sure they don't point it at anyone either.
Is your arm cannon always loaded too? Lol, love the username.
But seriously, WTF. First thing I was taught in gun safety was how to make DAMN sure that thing was empty, then to never act like the damn thing is empty, even if you just made damn sure it was.
And never trust a weapon is empty until you have confirmed it's empty, no matter how much you trust the person telling you it's empty.
And then still treat it as if it's not empty. Because it's impossible to sufficiently underscore how important it is to treat any firearm as if it's loaded.
Its that shit right there that pisses me off! Its so easy to check and take precautions against. Check the chamber, after that, turn the safety on, after that block the firing mechanism, after all of that, still treat it like its loaded and make sure its never pointed at anyone! Thats just basic gun safety!
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u/shellbullet17 Gustopher Spotter Extraordinaire 25d ago
He claimed he didn't know it was loaded. Which was a whole other can of worms.
Basically we didn't allow guns in the apartment after that night. We didn't live together much after that either.