Hammer follow discharge and variants

[Nik Habicht]

In my desire to do away with the catchall, unarbitratible(?) unsafe gunhandling rule I purposely neglected to consider the , not limited to, part of the example list.

I have always felt this was a rule to allow an RO to issue a DQ and not have it arbitrated. If you are going to DQ somebody then you best know what they did and what rule it broke. After 30 years of this sport I thnk our rules cover just about everything that is unsafe but maybe not everything a particular RO may dislike and thats the part that I dont like. This rule is there to give absolute unquestioned authority to an RO.

One example was given here on this thread. A shooter wasnt clearing his jam to the liking of the Ro and he Dq'd the shooter. Didnt Dq for sweeping or breaking hte 180 or an Ad. Just Dq'd him because he didnt like the way he was clearing a jam. Thats what I dont want to see in our sport.

Chuck,

I agree with the "dislike portion" 100%. I also think that some folks, even experienced shooters, can occasionally do really dumb things. On those days, they don't belong at a pistol match. As far as tipping the scale slightly in favor of the RO or the shooter --- I'm inclined to prefer to see it tipped toward the RO side of safety. Here's the catch though:

I think that a good RO realizes that he has to make some decisions under serious time pressure. Any RO worth his salt, will take a moment to think about the situation that just got him to call: "Stop! Unload and show clear." We want that from our match staff at the club match I run. We don't expect R.O.s to nail every call; we do expect them to learn from every call.

Whenever I hear of a situation/dispute on the range, whether it involves a DQ or not, I make it a point to listen to both parties. I usually ask a few questions. One question I always ask the R.O. and the shooter is "Are you certain?" Not because I question the veracity of their statement --- but because I want to be sure that we're making the right call.

I'm glad the phrase is there ---- but I think we ought to use it really sparingly. I also think that any DQ under 10.5 can be brought to arbitration --- whether the appeal would go to the shooter would depend on the panel. I know that if I was asked to serve on such an arbitration panel, I'd be asking a lot of questions before upholding a DQ, most likely more than for any of the cited 10.5 subsections.......

[kevin c]

Well, thanks all for the great points made.

I guess I was just more than a little alarmed that this shooter had two consecutive unintentional discharges, whether preventable or not, whether due solely to mechanical failure of the pistol or not, whether contributed to by the shooter's clearly distraught and alarming emotional state or not. SR and I stopped him after the first discharge, and there was a second one right after. The first was not preventable. I feel the shooter could and should have prevented the second by racking out the round w/o first thumbing back a hammer that he now knew might not be held back by the halfcock notch if it didn't stay back. That is what I was considering unsafe gun handling. It seems that that might not hold up in arb, and thats ok by me if the majority rules the shooter's way.

Honestly, we stopped him because we felt we had to - the rest was trying to piece it together afterwards.

Flex, you'd mentioned the gun not being "safe and serviceable" as a possible reason for stopping (I didn't say DQ'ing ) a shooter. If a gun failed to fire, that stops the shooter, and the RO would address any AD. I can't think, though, of any shooter under the clock who would stop himself if he still had a way of putting holes in the targets safely, and wouldn't any savvy range lawyer challenge the stoppage by the RO, saying that he was still able to shoot safely, and thus gain a reshoot?

SR, I'm glad all three of us made it through that stage and the rest of the day otherwise intact. And I'm glad we had each other's backs...

[chuckw]

Too bad no NROI instructors or rules specialists have weighed in on this one yet, coz my gut tells me they can throw light on the subject and tell us which of the opposing views here is on the right track. Anybody plan to ask Mr Amidon or whoever?

[Jim Norman]

Had an incident where the shooter's gun doubled and tripled. We stopped him. He was allowed to attempt a repair at the safe area, then we allowed an observed test fire. The gun still doubled on alternate shots, his gun was removed from the match. If he had a replacement gun of the same division and meeting all the other rules, he could have continued in the match.

Jim Norman

[JT Johnson]

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