DQ or no DQ? You make the call

[DocMedic]

Jesse can ask if a drawn handgun during the walk through should be a DQ!

I've seen this happen at a Local USPSA match once.. From a season Shooter who is Master class. I'm not sure what was going through his mind but I believe he was the first shooter so we were all behind him. Imagine the Egg on his face when he realized what he had done, and we were all watching him.

[kurtm]

My son drew a gun durring a walk through once...on a no-shoot target, a pretty good rendition of an Edge for a 5 year old with a Sharpie! Matter of fact the guys said it now "had" to be a shoot target because it was now armed.

[Wild Gene]

Dan,

Hope your mother is well. You are correct, this is trivial in contrast to other things in our lives.

At first I thought you said there was also a magazine in the pistol, now not sure, a mag would make the call really easy. Also some background on the particular match helped too.

I'm sure it was not an easy call or one you liked to have to make. It always makes me proud to be part of this community to hear someone say "the shooter accepted the DQ and took it well and stayed with the squat and helped reset targets for the rest of the match, etc., etc.".

Let us all be grateful this was a shooting issue and not nude selfies.

[Dan Sierpina]

Gene,

Thank you, Ma should be home in a day or so.

The magazine was not inserted, it was on the ground. I looked in the bucket, saw the slide out of battery, and hoped it was an empty case. As I said, a well intentioned, but, incompletely executed action. Had the shooter manipulated the slide a couple times, as some do, the round most likely would have fallen out of the pistol, unless the pistol was held horizontally.

[Jesse Tischauser]

OK, it's a discussion. How about you provide the rest of the story -- did this actually happen at a match? Run under which rules? What was the outcome?

I'm sorry to have taken so long to chime in on this. After 8 hours drive, unloading the truck, then heading to the hospital to visit my mother who was taken there on Friday morning after a fall and head laceration, this didn't seem so freaking important.

This did happen at a match. It was FNH 3 Gun, using their rules, which are made available prior to the match.

Competitors received an email August 20th with a link to the rules from statistician Linda Chico.

I was the stage CRO and regretfully had to make the call. It was a clear violation of the rule, 2.5.3.2 For some reason cut and paste does not work on this computer for this site.

The photo was a recreation. No phone or camera was inserted into the dump bucket at the match, so, it has to be a recreation.

Could the round have discharged the way it landed? No, it could not, it was wedged between the slide and the barrel ramp. The gun did have ammo in it, however. This rule is a yes or no situation. Had the MD / RM overridden this decision, I would decline to work the match in the future.

It was unfortunate, but, the shooter had a good intention, but, incompletely executed action. He didn't try and whine his way out of it, and simply said he would agree to whatever decision was made. We both reviewed the said rule, as a copy of the rules were in every stage binder in the match. He is a class act, he may regret the decision to have posted the recreated photo, much like the celebrities whose nude photos are now floating around the internet.

There are no standardized rules for most 3 gun matches. Each match seems to have variations of a basic rule set. The rules for this match were followed.

It's interesting to hear from "experts" that were not present. It seems like Alinsky tactics are trying to make in roads to the shooting sports.

Now, Jesse can ask if a drawn handgun during the walk through should be a DQ!

You made the correct call based on the rules Dan. Great job! Without good RO's like you working matches we wouldn't have any matches.

The question raft was posed was more geared towards do you agree with safety rules of empty gun, empty chamber and what penalty do you personally think should be associated with said rules. I purposely left out the who what where because it doesn't really matter.

I'm not sure why anyone would ask if we can all walk around or with our pistols out. You sound like a real Kurt with that one.

Edited September 22, 2014 by Jesse Tischauser

[DocMedic]

Gene,

Thank you, Ma should be home in a day or so.

The magazine was not inserted, it was on the ground. I looked in the bucket, saw the slide out of battery, and hoped it was an empty case. As I said, a well intentioned, but, incompletely executed action. Had the shooter manipulated the slide a couple times, as some do, the round most likely would have fallen out of the pistol, unless the pistol was held horizontally.

Just for my education but did the shooter drop the mag and racked the slide prior to abadoning the firearm, or did he simply drop the magazine assuming the gun was empty due to it not able to fire?

Edited September 22, 2014 by DocMedic

[Wild Gene]

If this was the FNH shoot, there were a lot of great shooters DQ'd. 25 or so. I'm not sure if I'd rather be DQ'd or finish last, hahaaa.

I got a safety or something (don't recall, it was 15 or so years ago, but it was a major match, blew me out of the competition) one time for grounding a gun with an empty on the carrier of my '73. A great friend made the call. We are still friends. I could see it honestly hurt him to bring this to light. What did happen as a direct result of that call was that this sort of discussion ensued and I believe was a part of larger discussion that may have eventually helped lead to a clarification of the rules for the national organization.

I think Jesse asking the question, bringing the subject to light is great. It makes most of us think about it and possibly learn something.

Take care everyone!

wg

[Dan Sierpina]

Gene,

Thank you, Ma should be home in a day or so.

The magazine was not inserted, it was on the ground. I looked in the bucket, saw the slide out of battery, and hoped it was an empty case. As I said, a well intentioned, but, incompletely executed action. Had the shooter manipulated the slide a couple times, as some do, the round most likely would have fallen out of the pistol, unless the pistol was held horizontally.

Just for my education but did the shooter drop the mag and racked the slide prior to abadoning the firearm, or did he simply drop the magazine assuming the gun was empty due to it not able to fire?

Curtis,

The shooter did drop the magazine and manipulate the slide in order to clear the pistol. As I said, the intended action was incompletely executed. I'm sure he assumed the round had cleared when he manipulated the slide, unfortunately, it bounced off his finger / hand or simply fell back in due to the orientation of the pistol.

[kurtm]

Ahh, classic Mr. T, classic! First a nice attempt at a character smear followed by a stunning 4th grade style taunt. You do need to expand your repertoire, you have become quite predictable.

As for Mr. T asking this question out of altruism, I proffer this statement from Mr. T from another forum. "I can't believe we have so many rules followers in this alpha male gun crowd". I think Dan called that part right as well.

Edited September 22, 2014 by kurtm

[SonOfSpartans]

The call was correctly made based on the rules. I understand and support those rules.

I have also stated my opinion based on the original question. All pistols, of any design, should be abandoned empty, maybe even hammer/striker down.

Perspective. I am the FNG. I have been competing for one year. In that time I have seen some interesting things. Perhaps a new thread would be in order.

1. A pistol with a magazine in but empty chamber falls from a holster while a competitor is moving with rifle. No DQ, allowed to retrieve it and continue.

2. A rifle is reloaded and the bolt released. The gun fires and sends a round off range. There was no clear call on the shooter's finger. No DQ.

3. Shooter running by an array of pistol targets toward a dump location to pick up the rifle. Drops the mag and fires the last round from the chamber. It was not a shot aimed at a target but it was in a safe direction. Discussion. No DQ.

4. Stage with a Texas star that must be shot with shotgun through the windows of a stage van. Hitting anything on the van was a match DQ. Same match, shooting small, close steel with buck or slugs was a 10 second procedural........ and the slug dented steel continued in the match.........

Every one of the above occurrences are fuel for conversation and lessons learned IMO

[ToysRUs]

The call was correctly made based on the rules. I understand and support those rules.

I have also stated my opinion based on the original question. All pistols, of any design, should be abandoned empty, maybe even hammer/striker down.

Perspective. I am the FNG. I have been competing for one year. In that time I have seen some interesting things. Perhaps a new thread would be in order.

1. A pistol with a magazine in but empty chamber falls from a holster while a competitor is moving with rifle. No DQ, allowed to retrieve it and continue.

2. A rifle is reloaded and the bolt released. The gun fires and sends a round off range. There was no clear call on the shooter's finger. No DQ.

3. Shooter running by an array of pistol targets toward a dump location to pick up the rifle. Drops the mag and fires the last round from the chamber. It was not a shot aimed at a target but it was in a safe direction. Discussion. No DQ.

4. Stage with a Texas star that must be shot with shotgun through the windows of a stage van. Hitting anything on the van was a match DQ. Same match, shooting small, close steel with buck or slugs was a 10 second procedural........ and the slug dented steel continued in the match.........

Every one of the above occurrences are fuel for conversation and lessons learned IMO

1. Depends on the match and its rules. Andy Horner, " it's a stick, pick it up and hurry" Other matches DQ, "I want a small Chocolate Extreme Blizzard."

2. Ad is an AD....The round leaves the range? DQ, "Still a small Chocolate Extreme Blizzard please."

3.Controlled shot inside the range. It's an MD call, probably no DQ (dang, I'm hot and thirsty")

4. Somethings wrong. Ruining steel is normally DQable. If the MD or range owner doesn't care it's on them. ("That's to bad i had a hankering for a Peanut Buster Parfait this time....")

Two things.

1. Got DQ'd this summer, counted out my shotgun rounds, felt the bolt lock back, dumped the gun, expended hull stovepiped, Gun deemed not empty. Yeah!! my first DQ ever! Bought my driver ice cream too!

2. Started shooting a custom 2011 this summer. Best advice was John Harris, (Yes I know him and good advice are like...well.. ) "If you drop the mag and run the slide the chance that your pistol can DQ you goes down 1000%". Especially considering that people used to tell me I threw my H&K in the bucket from 4-5 feet away!!

Gotta change tactics based on your firearm...

Ok, that's all, I'm Out!

Edited September 22, 2014 by ToysRUs

[Sterling White]

This topic floated right after it happened at the FNH by Jeremy on FB. He admitted his booboo and had no ill feelings towards the RO's - a real stand up guy. After the post his FB thread was commented on by many (and continues to the present); and like this thread, had a number of arm chair quarterbacks making the call. I even had to laugh because another MD chimed in on the topic saying "we changed the rules in our blah blah..." so things like this wouldn't happen. After reading Dan's comments on what happened I can appreciate the issue. I feel sorry for Jeremy for the bad luck. Dan (hope your family gets well soon) and feel bad that you and other RO's who follow and implement the rules for the match get drug into debate. Rules are rules as written.

[CJW]

Keeping just to the rules topic, I find myself interested in the question that was asked earlier in the thread---does the ruling here depend on whether the gun is a passive safety (e.g. Glock) system or not?

On the one hand, I think it would be odd that that gun could result in a DQ for a Glock shooter but if the round were actually chambered it would not be a DQ. On the other hand, I have always preferred to interpret the "safe pistol" rule (and have written it explicitly this way in our local club rules) as requiring a pistol to be either clear of any live rounds or be in a condition that would be acceptable for a loaded chamber, holstered start.

So, in the world where I get to write all the rules, that is a DQ for any pistol, because it has a live round and is not in an acceptable holstered start condition.

Dan (thanks for chiming in, and also best wishes to your mom for a speedy recovery), do you think the pistol type would have made a difference under FNH rules?

[Moltke]

Its obvious the right call was made here. According to the rules, this was a DQ. As a broader question related to this situation - Is there some unsafeness happening? I don't think so.

[Stlhead]

I like pie.

[J.Schmitt]

Pumpkin pie season is upon us, my favorite.

[Jim Norman]

Gene,

Thank you, Ma should be home in a day or so.

The magazine was not inserted, it was on the ground. I looked in the bucket, saw the slide out of battery, and hoped it was an empty case. As I said, a well intentioned, but, incompletely executed action. Had the shooter manipulated the slide a couple times, as some do, the round most likely would have fallen out of the pistol, unless the pistol was held horizontally.

Just for my education but did the shooter drop the mag and racked the slide prior to abadoning the firearm, or did he simply drop the magazine assuming the gun was empty due to it not able to fire?

Curtis,

The shooter did drop the magazine and manipulate the slide in order to clear the pistol. As I said, the intended action was incompletely executed. I'm sure he assumed the round had cleared when he manipulated the slide, unfortunately, it bounced off his finger / hand or simply fell back in due to the orientation of the pistol.

Keeping just to the rules topic, I find myself interested in the question that was asked earlier in the thread---does the ruling here depend on whether the gun is a passive safety (e.g. Glock) system or not?

On the one hand, I think it would be odd that that gun could result in a DQ for a Glock shooter but if the round were actually chambered it would not be a DQ. On the other hand, I have always preferred to interpret the "safe pistol" rule (and have written it explicitly this way in our local club rules) as requiring a pistol to be either clear of any live rounds or be in a condition that would be acceptable for a loaded chamber, holstered start.

So, in the world where I get to write all the rules, that is a DQ for any pistol, because it has a live round and is not in an acceptable holstered start condition.

Dan (thanks for chiming in, and also best wishes to your mom for a speedy recovery), do you think the pistol type would have made a difference under FNH rules?

Sadly on Stage Two we had several cases of not properly abandoned firearms. I think that a pistol should only be abandoned in a condition that would be acceptable holstered at the start of the COF. Rifles and Shotguns should be EMPTY. Allowing a Glock to have a chambered round and be tossed into a bucket but DQing a 1911 shooter with an empty chamber is not right. Therefore I reject the preceding. Any ammo in an abandoned handgun is a match DQ. There is Safety and there is the fact that this is a Match. Also having all guns required to be in the same condition eliminates any questions.

Recovering an abandoned firearm also resulted in at least one DQ. Why is this bad? One can say that everything that could go wrong is already covered under other rules. The shooter shall we say 'carefully places' his long gun n a bunker, they realizes he still needs it as he is racing past the bunker and he grabs the gun and as he pulls it from the bunker, he sweeps the RO and perhaps the crowd. I the initial pick up of a staged gun the gun is placed to facilitate picking it up, in recovering an abandoned firearm that staging is not present and the potential for bad things to happen that are not prevented by double and triple redundant safety rules is missing.

[kurtm]

Four and twenty Blackbirds baked in a pie?

[Dan Sierpina]

I got hooked on fresh peach pie back when I shot the Masters.

[Dan Sierpina]

In response to CJW's question.

The way the unfired cartridge landed in the gun, no safety would have worked. Only another slide manipulation to release the cartridge from the grasp of the two metal parts of the pistol.

As I said in my early response, the round couldn't have gone off, nor could the safety been activated, but it was in the pistol.

For the well wishers, my mom was returned home this evening.

Thank you all.

[Shooter115]

For the sake of discussion I believe the RO's call of a DQ was correct as it followed the rules to a T. That is the job of the RO. That said, IMHO a call to the RM should have reversed that call to a stage DQ/stage zero. The safety rules as written were broken, but in a fluke manner that in no way was this actually an unsafe weapon. There's no way a rule book can be written to cover every singe scenario that can come up in a match. That's where your RM comes into play. To act as a majistrate and determine those gray area calls. If the RM deemed this a match DQ worthy offense I would have to disagree. A mistake like this should sting, but it shouldn't end your match.

[Jim Norman]

All DQs were called up to the RM and he showed up for each. Overturning a DQ for other than the error in reading the rules or RO error is a bad precedent. Should the rules be changed? I don't think so. We play a game akin to running with scissors and reducing the safety rules will eventually lead to disaster.

[Vlad]

A mistake like this should sting, but it shouldn't end your match.

Why? It is either a safe gun in which can why should it sting at all, there should be no penalty or it is an unsafe gun in which case it should smart like hell and be a DQ. I wonder if this in between half measures of stage DQs and the like are partially to blame for people getting lax on how they abandon guns.

[Jadeslade]

All of this is arbitrary. Any expert can be opposed by an equal and opposite expert. If you choose "if I pull the trigger, what happens" in your last decision box, a 1911 loaded with manual safety on - nothing happens, a Glock goes boom. At some point, the first Glock shooters in 3 gun must have convinced match directors that a Glock in the box is safe. As is the gun in the photo. As is any gun in any dump box. Safety on or off. Loaded or not. When it is inert. When a human comes into contact with that gun-that's the danger time. We are really saying is that we want the gun proofed against all humans who might take that gun out of the dump box. Like an empty gun. But making a gun empty is not necessarily safe either. Try to remember if you have seen somebody unload a gun in a hurry and thought, "what a putz". I see nothing wrong with unloading rounds at the berm or just down range,for some reason that is considered unsafe. It isn't. I'm glad so many people read the rules and know what the dump conditions are for their matches. That does not mean that those conditions are really safe. Or unsafe. There is nothing unsafe about the gun Jesse posted. Our sport is safe because most shooters are safe and we all follow the basic rules. If you let all guns be cleared by the shooter after the run, there would be no issue of safety. Because that's what we all do all the time when we go to the range. It's only when you let somebody else try to clear your gun that unsafe actions occur. My fault tree is different than your fault tree. A fault tree is no different than any other flow chart with decision boxes. Experienced people do this all the time without knowing it is called a fault tree. The bad thing with guns is the gun firing when we don't want it to fire. I do not like it when RO's clear guns. They don't load them, do they? However, I must live with it because that is the way 3 gun is set up. And the safety rules reflect that. Just don't tell me that our sport of 3 gun is safe because of those rules peculiar to each match. It is safe because we all follow the common basic rules.

[Shooter115]

A mistake like this should sting, but it shouldn't end your match.

Why? It is either a safe gun in which can why should it sting at all, there should be no penalty or it is an unsafe gun in which case it should smart like hell and be a DQ. I wonder if this in between half measures of stage DQs and the like are partially to blame for people getting lax on how they abandon guns.

Because the rule on abandonment was broken per the way it was written, but at the same time was no real safety risk. There's no feasible way that the weapon could be manipulated to fire, unless one really tried hard and had some kinda slick super ninja way of getting that round back in the chamber. But in the end the rule was broken. This is one of those areas where I feel a stage DQ is a fair call. You may or may not agree with it, but if I were the RM, that's how I would have called it.

I don't have the years of experience many here do, so I understand my opinion doesn't weigh in as heavily as some. In the 3 or 4 years that I've been shooting 3gun, I've been fortunate (or slow and cautious) enough not to have ever been dealt a match DQ, but I did get a stage DQ once in my first year shooting. I'll explain and y'll can chime in. Shotgun, rifle and pistol stage where all 3 guns were staged and abandoned on a single table pointed down range. The shooter never went ahead of this table. The clubs rules at the time (this has since changed) said guns had to be completely empty and the safety selector didn't matter. I had a mag spring in my shotgun that got weak and my M2 locked the bolt back with a round stuck half on the lifter, half still in the tube. I saw the bolt locked back, put the safety on (even though it didn't matter) and put the shotgun back on the table pointed down range. After finishing the stage the round half on the lifter was discovered. Gun pointed down range, chamber open, safety on and never moved ahead of the weapon. The RO's (who is a friend of mine) initial call was a DQ as I broke the rules per the way they were written, but he wanted get a second opinion from the RM. RM came and made the call that while it violated the written rule, since I never advanced beyond the weapon and there was never any remote risk of that gun firing, made the call of a stage DQ. I would have been fine with the decision either way, but I appreciated being able to finish the match and not be sent home for a "non-safety" safety violation. Now in any of the matches I shoot now, this would not be an issue as the safety was on and this club has also since changed the rules to include that an engaged safety makes a "safe" gun, but the time, the written rules were broken and some sort of penalty should have been implied. Right or wrong?

Edited September 23, 2014 by Shooter115