The Most Common Types of Negligent Discharge

hey everyone; Thanks for Sharing your NG anecdotes. I know that many of these events are embarrassing and many were damned scary when they happened. All of them can be helpful to prevent others from making perhaps very costly mistakes. So again, thank you.

The 2 loudest sounds: A Bang when you're expecting a Click and a Click when you're expecting a Bang.

I tried a negligent discharge joke, it didn't go off like expected.

My teaching was simple: the only time the chamber is empty is when you are looking at the empty chamber. As soon as you can't see the chamber, the gun is loaded.

An ugly one: When I was in the Norwegian Army in the early 70s, a guy in the neighboring company for whatever reason forgot a live round in the chamber when taking the magazine out after a day on the range. He didn't find out until the cleaning session later that day. Then the round went off and his comrade was fatally hit in the abdomen. A very tragic and very effective lesson. 45 years later I still remember this incident like yesterday...

Important thing to remember, "lot of people are bit by dogs that don't bite and get shot by guns that aren't loaded."

He could pull an RPG out of his pocket and casually use it to explain something, and i would just accept it.

About 15 years ago, I failed to remove the magazine and empty the chamber in the right order. Left a loaded rifle on the table while I went to get my cleaning supplies. My brother picked the rifle up and checked to ensure it was unloaded as proper gun safety measures dictate. He found it had been loaded the entire time. Thinking about what could have happened still gives me a feeling of absolute dread.

This video is definitely going to appear in court as a reference soon....

One day, while out hunting, I got lost. Knowing that the proper distress signal is ‘firing three shots in the air’, I proceeded to do so. Nobody came, so I did it again. I waited a while longer and fired three more shots. Finally, another hunter found me and took me back to the lodge. On the way back, I said “It’s a good thing that you found me. I was almost out of arrows”. 😂

I started carrying a gun after an attempted mugging a few years ago.... ...since then my mugging attempts have been a lot more successful.

I just had my first one yesterday. I was on an unsupervised range in the middle of nowhere, I was testing handloads in my BFR .500 Magnum. It single action, everytime I cock it I have to move my supporting hand to reach the hammer and then carefully regrip my hands. Well, I'm not 100% sure what I did, because I had gloves on, but somehow I must of touched the trigger and shot the dirt about a yard from my feet. The gun went flying and landed about 10 feet away. I feel so terrible, I'm not sure I've ever felt this bad about anything in my life.

Hi Paul, British guy here, late to the party with a Negligent Discharge story from my school days (30+ years ago): We had an indoor smallbore rifle range at our school, run under the auspices of the Ministry of Defence for our school cadet force. One of the regulations was that only single-shot bolt-action .22 calibre target rifles could be used on it. It was a narrow building, 6 firing points, the rifle lockers down one side wall in front of the firing point (protected by sandbags from any stray bullets). The master in charge would sit on a canvas backed chair behind the firing point, with the door behind him. The headmaster owned a pump action .22 magazine rifle and had allowed some of the shooters to use it one day, in defiance of the aforementioned restriction. At the end of the detail, the two shooters were clearing up when someone came to the door, so the master got up from his chair and went outside to talk to him. One boy was downrange putting rifles in the lockers, the other boy was on the firing point and picked up the pump action to check it was clear. As there was a boy downrange he turned and pointed it at the master's chair to dry fire it after cycling the action twice. To his astonishment, it went off, blowing a surprisingly large hole in the chair's canvas back and an even larger one in the wooden doorpost, thankfully not penetrating all the way through. There was hell to pay. The commanding officer of the CCF, a former Army Sergeant Major who had been unaware of the pump-action rifle's use on the range, insisted on reporting it as a dangerous incident to the MoD. The school could have lost the licence for shooting and possibly even its funding for the cadet force. The headmaster nearly lost his personal firearms license.

Proving Rule 0: "The gun is always loaded, especially when it isn't."

One time I was handed a rifle at a gun shop, and naturally I checked the chamber. The employee huffed and asked "Do you really think I would hand you a loaded weapon?" That kind of cavalier attitude to the readiness condition of a firearm is what often leads to NDs.

The year was 2000 I came home after a long day of work and had an accident discharge. My son now 21 loves your videos.

A few weeks ago, I came home from running some errands and I unloaded my carry pistol as I do when I enter my place of residence. I pulled the mag out and unchambered the round. Usually, I just let the round fall on the table and then pick it up, but when I ejected the round, it flipped up in the air and fell back into the chamber as it closed. This didn't lead to a negligent discharge because I saw it happen, but I thought I would share the anecdote as to make sure you always double check your chamber.

Always remember this: The loaded gun kills your enemy and the empty gun kills your friend.

In Russia we have a saying, "Once a year, even a broom fires a shot." Don't ever point a firearm in a direction you aren't willing to shoot. You may think the chamber is empty, you might have even checked, but once a year, even a broom fires a shot.

I've had a BB gun in my hands at 7 years old and knew the 5 rules. One thing I can be thankful for, is a dad that taught me a healthy fear and respect for firearms. Once you see what they can do later on in life, it just reinforces that respect. You are carrying around a death finger. That said, I have never had a negligent discharge in my whole life. I think the biggest thing that causes this, is simply not paying full attention to what you are doing with what's in your hands.