An unsafe gun friend

[Valkman]

I can't stand getting swept with a firearm, and I quit going to gun shows in the 90's because of it. The last time I went I look around at an idiot pointing a shotgun right at me. That's over 20 years ago, maybe 25, and I remember it like it was yesterday. If your friend does this routinely along with the ND's you need to RUN away from this guy.

I have made mistakes, and remember them vividly. I have not repeated them and learned from my mistakes, which is what your friend does not do and this is unacceptable. This guy reminds me of a guy who borrows a table saw, cuts his fingers off, gets healed and borrows the saw again and does it again. Except you or your family will be the victim of a guy who doesn't learn from his mistakes.

 

[Bazoo]

There was mention made of the Range officer. Let’s be clear, the range is my personal range on my farm. He does go to the public indoor range some. He’s more unsafe at show and tell than the range. Though... one of the NDs was on my range.

I thought it pretty funny that he shot his car. Upon reflection though it wasn’t very far from my legs.

My wife isn’t as concerned about it as I am. She doesn’t think I should just run him off. I don’t want to run him off. I want him to be more aware, more careful, treat every gun as if it’s loaded.

I don’t have any other hobbies and few other interests other than guns, so golf isn’t an option. But anything else I do, fishing for example, I would be carrying. I assume he would be too as he’s into cc.

I don’t drink. He might would have a beer. I don’t think he drinks at all but maybe he’ll have one very rarely... so booze as a medium is out of the picture.

 

[Valkman]

My wife isn’t as concerned about it as I am. She doesn’t think I should just run him off. I don’t want to run him off.

It's your funeral (or your wife's) - if you don't run him off. I've said what I thought but it's pretty obvious you are going to keep him around. My wife would've banned him from the house if he had a ND in it. No minds are being changed here, I'm out.

 

[Bazoo]

But he does get defensive pretty quick about things. My wife noticed it even. An example, and don’t get into politics with my example it’s just what I thought of. We talk politics some. He’s real pro trump. So I’m not so much pro trump as I am anti the other guy.... and he gets all uptight because I basically said trump wasn’t all that great, just a whole lot better than the alternative.

So I’m thinking how can I approach him and him not be so defensive and uptight. My wife said maybe call him on the little things some. I realize, I don’t do that. I generally just don’t say anything and take mental note.

The YouTube safety video is a good idea. Anyone suggest one? I don’t know who to look for or whatever. I’m not a YouTube person.

 

[Bazoo]

It's your funeral (or your wife's) - if you don't run him off. I've said what I thought but it's pretty obvious you are going to keep him around. My wife would've banned him from the house if he had a ND in it. No minds are being changed here, I'm out.

I’m not looking for support to run him off. I’m looking for ideas to help get him out of his bad habits.

 

[Mark_Mark]

I’m not looking for support to run him off. I’m looking for ideas to help get him out of his bad habits.

show him a youtube gun safely video. Tell him Safely is my new thing and all the cool old cats are doing it.

 

[Valkman]

I’m not looking for support to run him off. I’m looking for ideas to help get him out of his bad habits.

You've been told in all kinds of ways that making him safer is probably not going to happen. Taking a safety class with him is about the only possibility I see but I also doubt it would work. Do what you will.

 

[Mark_Mark]

here a GREAT one from NSSF - bunch of old guys who do this for a living

 

[Mark_Mark]

I’m not looking for support to run him off. I’m looking for ideas to help get him out of his bad habits.

this is a important issue and I know your stuck between a rock and a hard place. Keep voicing your concerns. that’s what this community is here for!

 

[Scooter22]

I don't get why this thread is still going. Bazoo is still making excuses so it's on him. Enabler. Nothing said has changed his mind. Don't waste any more time on posts. I have a whacked out bipolar SIL that should be committed from what she has done all her life. But people keep making suggestions and excuses like on here.. Sorry move on.

 

[JohnKSa]

I know a guy who has had at least two NDs that I know of. One of them killed someone. After that, a friend of mine went shooting with him and said that the guy scared him to death--said he would never go shooting with him again. So the fatal ND apparently made no difference in his behavior. A few years back he shot a hole in the door of a local gun shop, from the inside. I don't know what's wrong with the guy, but he's very obviously not going to change. I will interact with him, but only in a context where I know he's not armed. He's literally a loose cannon.

On the occasions that I’ve said something more he always gets defensive.

1. He has no room to be defensive.
2. His feelings really aren't what's important here. You need to get the point across and if you can't, you need to stay away from him when he's armed. If you can get the point across you could save your life, or his, or someone else's. If you can't, at least you can protect yourself and your loved ones.

 

[Mark_Mark]

I know a guy who has had at least two NDs that I know of. One of them killed someone. After that, a friend of mine went shooting with him and said that the guy scared him to death--said he would never go shooting with him again. So the fatal ND apparently made no difference in his behavior. A few years back he shot a hole in the door of a local gun shop, from the inside. I don't know what's wrong with the guy, but he's very obviously not going to change. I will interact with him, but only in a context where I know he's not armed. He's literally a loose cannon.1. He has no room to be defensive.
2. His feelings really aren't what's important here. You need to get the point across and if you can't, you need to stay away from him when he's armed. If you can get the point across you could save your life, or his, or someone else's. If you can't, at least you can protect yourself and your loved ones.

Can of Worm is open, We all know “that guy” so what do we do?

I personally like to go shooting alone or not at all. I just can’t relax when I’m hyper vigilant.

When I shoot at matches, everyone knows the rules or get DQ. I’m relax then. But beside that, I go to the range alone and pay my fee so the RO can let me relax.

 

[Atavar]

All you can do is stay vocal. When he does something stupid call him on it, not nicely. Like "Hey ******* - watch where yur pointing that thing!’

 

[MEHavey]

The OP -- and everyone else here -- can clearly see the handwriting on the wall/eventual outcome.
I would counsel not to enable his presence where firearms are in play in any manner.
Xin loi.....

.

 

[Remington1911]

This is in my typical long winded form, sorry.

TLDNR version, buddy has gun issue, use the time fixing issue to talk about safety, buddy asks to watch him closer and help with mistakes.



You have gotten lots of really good replies, I can't really add too much more, but I will add I have the same kind of friend, not to that extent, but just a little rough around the edges....

Story time.

Me and this buddy are out in back of the house shooting and BS'ing.....you could look at shooting as an excuse to BS as generally more yacking goes on then pulling a trigger. He practices good trigger as well as muzzle ddiscipline but catching something that is not quite right....nope. We are standing side by side banging away on some steel, when I hear a pfft, I look over and see his pistol is not in battery and will not go into battery......and he is looking at it. Bangs on the back of the slide a sec, and I can tell I need to do something here.

Whats up.
don't know
Can I see
sure.
drop mag fish out halfway in halfway out unfired cartridge
lock slide back
Can't see anything funny, stick my finger into the back of the barrel....is something in there?
turn around look down its nose....no daylight.....you got a squib buddy, what ya shootin?
This, winchester white box. (he does not reload) and to him I define a brass goblin.
whats a squib
look down here, the bullet for some reason did not leave the barrel.
is that bad
ever see a semi truck hit a smart car
no
can you imagine it
yup
there ya go.

We shoot other stuff for the rest of the day, we get to the house and I say lets see that, can not, no way no how get that bullet out of the barrel...it is REALLY jammed in there....could it have been that oversized....no way.....all I know is it will not come out.

pistol apart, barrel out and a little more "force" is applied trying to get the bullet out. Well buddy I could get it out, and would get it out on my gun but don't want to do it to yours.....I really am into the gray area for my skill set here, might take it to a real gun smith.

you think you could get it.
sure
go for it
chance I could ruin the barrel
do you think you will
no, but there is a chance
ok do it.
sure
yup.

Ok.

Try locking barrel in a quick made up fixture and pushing it out with a long dowel rod and a wood working clamp that ratchets to put force on it.....busts the dowel rod.

Hmm.....one other idea is to drill it out.
can you do that
sure, lead is real soft I will know if I hit steel, but if I do hit steel it will not be good.
ok lets go.

(I am thinking at this point it has become something he is really wanting to see how I get it out)

Out come the drill bits, start small and work my way up.....REAL SLOW.

Finally we drill as much as I think we can without hitting the barrel itself, and a cut down dowel rod comes back into play.....crack. Well I have had about enough of this, get a brass cleaning rod and a 38 jag, it did come out, but the rod did not survive. Bore scope the barrel and all looks good....put together and on our way.

Now to swing this back on topic, we had lots of time to talk during this little project and we talked a great deal about gun safety, and you need to be in tune with just what that thing in your hand is doing, you need to watch for an impact after you shoot, any impact....something to show you that the bullet left the barrel.

I think having that happen to him was a bit of a come to Jesus moment, seeing first hand how stuck was stuck, me telling him....yea you are going to need to learn to wright right handed now (he is a lefty) as well as having a new nickname stubby.

After all this he asks after I retire am I going to open a gun smith store....hell no, I don't know anything, just enough to be dangerous. We go down the road on how he could never fix it, you have a different skill set then I do, nothing wrong with that and that does not mean you can't enjoy stuff. Loves his mustang but could not change the oil at gunpoint. Yea but you could rebuild the engine....yea perhaps in another life, but you know how, yea but you know how to do things I can't, you are a published wrighter, if you ever read something I wrote you would think a held back 3rd grader did it. (this guy also called a plumber to fix a running toilet) I am working on this.

BTW this guy is in his late 50's and married.

To swing back around to the topic again, he tells me if I do something stupid or miss something let him know, he wants to get better.....sure deal. We don't shoot side by side anymore, I do play a little more range officer now, but that is fine.

I can't tell you how to work into this subject with your friend OP, but you do need to try to have a talk with him

Dog that was long.

 

[lightman]

This is serious enough that it needs to be resolved. I hope you can work it out and still be friends.

I quit hunting with my Father-in-law for this very reason. Everytime we walked in the woods he would have me covered with the muzzle of his rifle or shotgun several times. When I finally got tired of constantly swapping sides with him I called him on it. He quickly informed me that the Army taught him gun safety. I never hunted with him again. He won a few medals in WWII.

 

[GBExpat]

... How best to approach this? ...

Sounds to me like your buddy has proven ... re-peat-ed-ly ... that he is incapable of safely handling firearms.

You have a wife? children? People who love/depend upon you? After your friend accidentally kills or cripples you with the firearm that he happens to be mishandling at the moment, I am sure that your people (and you, if you survive) won't mind because he was your best buddy and did not intend to do it.

If, considering his history & your valid concerns, he would not accept and carefully adhere to a No Firearms policy in your mutual friendship, perhaps he is not really your Friend.

Life is full of choices. Good luck with this one. It may be a Biggie.

 

[daniel craig]

I have only one shooting buddy. He is somewhat unsafe. I enjoy running around to gun stores with him and we talk guns. But he does little things that ain’t safe.

He occasionally will muzzle me or others. Okay no big deal, everyone makes mistakes. He keeps making them.

But he does other things. He often leaves the safety off on his gun when shooting. It’s just not a habit like it is for me to put the safety on. Especially when shooting clays. Like for example, if he lets me shoot his gun , he’ll hand it to me with the safety off. When I return it with the safety on, he will always pull the trigger and no bangy because he didn’t assume the safety to be on and didn’t check. Does the same when we are shooting 22 rifles.

But when shooting a Rossi 92 he will put the safety on, as if half cock ain’t enough there.

Then sometimes he will show me his carry gun, unload it and look at it. When he loads it back, instead of stop looking at it, he has occasionally, turned it sideways and muzzled my wife, or me to show me a feature of the gun he forgot to mention. Finger off the trigger cause it was loaded...

Once he shot a round off in my house. He’s always dry firing. So in this instance he showed me his loaded carry gun, I unloaded it, checked it out, loaded it back and handed it back in the same condition it was handed to me in. He pointed it and bang. No one was hurt. He did have it pointed in a safe direction. He said he thought I unloaded it and was just going to dry fire. So trying to duck the blame and put it on me.

I found out later he did the same at his house. Dry firing.

I’ve seen him have his finger on the trigger when readjusting the grip on a cocked single action. Muzzle was pointed upwards. On the range. I mentioned it and he got huffy. I’ve seen him do the same thing with his off hand over the cylinder gap.... that would have sucked for him.

I’ve tried to mention things here and there and he always gets defensive. He was in the air force. He says I was safe enough in the AF and now I’m not safe I guess. He goes to an indoor range and he must be safe enough for them? Maybe they ain’t got high standards.

I’ve been friends with him 20 years or so. He’s only been “into” guns 10 years or so. Friends with his son. He’s a nice guy, Christian, fun to go to gun stores with. But he just does these little things here and there that are unsafe.

Then of course he’s had 3 NDs I’m aware of. One was on the range, so it wasn’t as bad but still. He was behind me I here pow. Single six was in his hands. He shot his car. We were using his trunk for a table.

So anyways. He’s a great friend, and fun to go to gun stores with. And he’s my only friend to go do that sort of thing with. So, I put up with his unsafe gun handling. I’ve considered several things. Just telling him he’s unsafe and so be it if I lose him as a friend. I have been limiting the amount I’m around him on the range and try to look at guns outside rather than inside the house to help mitigate the issue. I don’t particularly want to hurt his feelings and just run him off. He’s not just my only shooting buddy, he’s really one of only a handful of friends I have.

How best to approach this?

Thanks for reading. Prayer and advice welcomed here.

I'd have a frank and one time Convo with him. "Bro, if you want to shoot with me, I'm teaching you safety. If you fail to adhere to such training, you and I will NEVER shoot again. This stuff ain't a joke."

And if he reacts poorly, that's on him.

 

[Hokkmike]

Is hurting his feelings really the worst thing that could happen?

 

[Remington1911]

I'd have a frank and one time Convo with him. "Bro, if you want to shoot with me, I'm teaching you safety. If you fail to adhere to such training, you and I will NEVER shoot again. This stuff ain't a joke."

And if he reacts poorly, that's on him.

True, but the outcome is 100% dependent on the delivery. I did mine in a very loose, way Not a my way or the highway tone at all.

Later that same day the neighbor came over, she knows I shoot and my property is really better setup for it, she is just flat pasture and horses....mine dips down into a lake, and I have some natural rise and fall that just make the layout better. They also know I shoot.

I was pretty spent by that time, so did a great deal of sitting, and some very basic sight picture....yea it was base one. She never loaded a gun before in her life. The "bullets" go into the magazine facing this way type deal, think base 1.

I am going to cut this short, I could ramble but perhaps in that new shooter thread I will make if I ever get off my duff.

Women, female, girls, babes, dames, humans that never came into the world with dangly bits between their legs....are much more easy to teach this stuff to, and much more open to the correct form of correction....sharp smack on the butt is not correct.....

Men in general don't check their ego, they done learned it in the army and are done with learning. Some will see someone that knows a little more as a resource of information, but most nope......

The key is the way you take care of this......even if you need to spin it to yourself. In the example above where the FiL was the issue, it would be a it makes ME nervous please don't do it.....whatever the excuse is that it is ok, refute that as a ME problem, I just am not comfortable looking down the end of your deer rifle.....been shot at before and that really makes me just nervous.....if nice ways to alter actions don't work chances are more....rough.....ways will not work as well.

 

[Bazoo]

I have talked to his son. His son has kids. They are thinking on doing a safety course. I suggested grandpa be included. Maybe, it’ll work.

I appreciate @Mark_Mark suggesting that. I didn’t think of it.

 

[FL-NC]

Unsafe is unsafe. If you aren't safely manipulating/handling a firearm, they eventually get fired when/where they shouldn't be. The bullet(s) end up in whatever (or whoever) the gun was pointed at during that out-of-control moment, and maybe even hit multiple objects or people. I don't hang around untrained/unsafe people operating firearms, vehicles, machinery, power tools, explosives, chemicals, fire, etc.- any more than I would want to fly in an aircraft piloted by someone without a license or have surgery done to me by a grocery store butcher. After multiple live fire incidents, it has become a pattern and is beyond self-correction, IMO. Either the individual needs to be properly trained, or the element of danger (the individual or the firearms) need to be removed from the equation.

 

[armedwalleye]

Although I offered my thoughts previously, I do have to say that this thread has certainly given rise to a discussion topic for I and my range partner.

We are both very careful, and have never had similar incidents such as yours, but I will be pointing out the next time we’re together that I fully expect him, if he observes unsafe behavior in my actions to be very direct with me immediately about it, and I fully intend to stand there and take it.

Friendships are important to me. My safety and his are even more important. I suspect if I offer him free reign to correct my unsafe behaviors, he will reciprocate.

May be an approach for consideration.

 

[Remington1911]

Although I offered my thoughts previously, I do have to say that this thread has certainly given rise to a discussion topic for I and my range partner.

We are both very careful, and have never had similar incidents such as yours, but I will be pointing out the next time we’re together that I fully expect him, if he observes unsafe behavior in my actions to be very direct with me immediately about it, and I fully intend to stand there and take it.

Friendships are important to me. My safety and his are even more important. I suspect if I offer him free reign to correct my unsafe behaviors, he will reciprocate.

May be an approach for consideration.

Yup we are all humans, and guess what humans make mistakes, always have always will, if a person says they never do you just talked to a not so honest person. Other people I am with go different ways with the safety, some will pull the bolt out of the rifle if we walk down range (just the two of us), I find it silly but still ask him about it, well they had an escape at the prison a while ago, and I just got to thinking....well sound logic to me, he also locks his range bag and does not leave a hand gun on the table, slide open and in his holster, or the little yellow flag sticking out of it.

I get that and in my mind I see and agree with his logic, but I don't do that.

 

[TomJ]

I haven't had time to read all the posts so this may be repetitive, but maybe a tactful way that may not affect your friendship to approach him is to express concern for him and how what he's doing can harm him. Let him know you're concerned about the legal and civil consequences he'll be subject to if someone is injured by a ND he has and that you're also concerned about him injuring himself. Remind him of the 4 rules. If after all his ND's he's still unwilling to meet you halfway and correct his behavior I'd avoid any situations where he and a gun would be around me. You can't allow him to kill or injures you, one of your loved ones or anyone else because he hasn't learned from multiple ND's.