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Comment by mothballed | Hacker News Reader

Try conceal carrying or outside the waistband without ever pointing a loaded handgun at something you don't want to kill. It is pretty much impossible, unless you're using a pretty unusual holster. A waistband holster will pretty much always end up pointing it towards some part of your body at some point, and even a shoulder holster it is pointing at someone else.

Carrying a handgun relies on that rule not being followed and instead the holster preventing anyone from pulling the trigger, but if the gun can go off without a trigger pull all bets are off.

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I’m not a gun guy. I can accept that sometimes a holstered gun ends up pointing at somebody occasionally. And I can accept that a gun might rarely discharge at random for a while, I mean that’s a design flaw but if it is rare enough I guess it will take a while to be recalled, right?

But does it seem a little weird that the two events coincided?

That goes for every co-incidence. It's called that for a reason and they are always 'a little weird'. I listen to the Electric Light Orchestra, my neighbors light bulb burns out. It is more than 'a little weird'. It is also a coincidence. And it probably happened more than once.

Keep in mind you would not have heard of it if the story was "gun goes off somewhere in america, no one harmed, desk now has awkward hole". It's like the anthropic principle of news. You would really have to dig into the base rates to know if the coincidence is suspicious.

>I can accept that sometimes a holstered gun ends up pointing at somebody occasionally.

It's not occasional. If you carry AIWB (appendix inside the waistband, a common position), it's routinely pointing at your own leg (and other anatomy) as you move around.

It does strike me as a bit odd to hand a holstered gun to someone while pointing it at them -- as a matter of politeness, if nothing else. But there are other incidents where a P320 is said to have discharged into the leg of someone carrying it in a holster.

Holstered guns shouldn't have a round in the chamber. That's also very negligent.

That's hilarious.

I'll admit, that one's just my opinion, since the community is very divided on this and there's no consensus.

I feel that the safety versus response time trade off is worth it for me. It could be from my military background, but for me a negligent discharge is one of the worst things I could possibly do with a firearm. I was also raised to never trust a safety and unload my gun when crossing fence lines while hunting.

Fair enough, I can respect the difference in opinion. A couple notes though on the military or hunters ed training safety that might influence their training

1) The safety mechanisms on say a glock are different than on a lot of military rifles soldiers are trained on. An Ar-15/M16 can go off without pulling the trigger if the firing pin gets stuck in the channel. That won't happen with a glock because the safety physically blocks the primer from being struck. Also in theory a free-floating firing pin could maybe somehow get slammed hard enough or slam an abused primer enough to set off some military rifles.

2) Some hunting shotguns or military rifles aren't drop safe. Modern handguns are.

3) A military rifle or hunting rifle generally has the trigger exposed at all times you are carrying it. A CCW handgun, you are not exposing the gun and trigger unless you are about to shoot someone.

Now I've never served in the military, other than a rag-tag Kurdish militia. What I would imagine the boot sergeant or whatever they are called do, is tells the soldier they will keep the manual safety on or the weapon unchambered and leave it at that, because explaining the intricacies of a striker-fired pistol vs an M16 to a bunch of barely out of highschoolers from Guam who are already exhausted from sleep deprivation and jarring work-outs would not be terribly productive.

> An Ar-15/M16 can go off without pulling the trigger if the firing pin gets stuck in the channel. That won't happen with a glock because the safety physically blocks the primer from being struck.

This is precisely one of the issues with Gen1 Glocks that was remediated. The firing pin safety prevents the firing pin from moving forward unless the gun is in battery and the trigger is partially depressed. It doesn't force the pin to move backwards if it is jammed forward (due to dirt). A pin that's jammed will slam fire the gun when racked.

Always rack in a safe direction.

Carrying a chambered gun in a holster covering the trigger is not negligent. It's how millions of military, law enforcement, and civilians carry on a daily basis.

Having one in the chamber IS actually a fucking ridiculous way to carry on a daily basis. That makes sense in a war zone, it makes zero sense walking the streets of any American city.

Source: many years of carrying a weapon in a professional capacity.

I would recommend you take an entry level CCW class. There are valid reasons why one would or wouldn't carry with one in the chamber, and opinions can be respected. However, not knowing why it might make sense for someone else to choose indicates severely flawed "professional" knowledge and a deficient education. Most of the 'against' reasons are much stronger with the kind of rifles soldier get drilled on in boot camp, some of whom walk away with a very simplified view of gun safety tailored around their military rifle that is wrongly generalized to modern striker fired CCW pistols.

I certainly don't expect I'll be able to address this from someone confidently bragging about years of "professional" experience carrying an unchambered weapon as the only right way to do it on the street, so hopefully you can find a class with someone with a background you respect so it will go through your brain.

There absolutely are valid reasons. Like I said, patrolling in an active war zone is an example of one.

Walking around on base for example isn’t even remotely close to one. This isn’t uniquely an American thing but it’s extremely common in the US in a way that absolutely isn’t in any kind of comparable country.

I don’t know what it is exactly, other than maybe the very weird and extremely pervasive “operator mentality” that seems to make everyone extremely horny for pretending situations are much more dangerous than they really are.

If you’re going to carry a weapon it’s really a very basic requirement that you can do some reasonable level of threat analysis and respond to the situation around you as it develops.

Again, I’m not saying those situations don’t exist where it makes sense but they are absolutely the exception and are a very weird thing to pretend are the default. I think it’s a culture problem and people are just scared.

Everyone "on base" in the USA has had a background check. I've visited bases (never been in the military), they will not let you in without running a background check. Sometimes people on base might have a mental breakdown but they are not letting people with history of armed robbery or felony assault etc on base. You are much safer on base from a surprise pistol-range attack than you are on the street. The threat on base are people outside the base, you know, in rifle and not pistol range.

On the flipside, when I got a flat on my bicycle in the city a guy walked up to me with a gun, pointed a gun at me to take my shit, and I would not have had time to rack a weapon (and god forbid it jammed). I knocked the guy's arm and punched the guy which stunned him enough that I was able to run off without him getting a good shot off; I would have had enough time to get off a shot with a chambered weapon (didn't carry at the time) but I never would have stood a chance if I pulled out an unchambered gun.

But this is exactly what I mean. I’m not shooting anyone over a fucking robbery for gods sake.. it’s such an incredibly disproportionate response to the situation. Likewise, there’s almost no situation where he was ever going to shoot you. Just hand over your shit and move on, everyone can go home to their families.

The only scenario where things start to get ACTUALLY dangerous is you pulling out a weapon and suddenly you’ve gone from a 5/10 situation to a 10/10 situation where everyone is liable to panic and do something stupid. You’re about to go from a bad day to maybe your last day here and for what? There is just no point in that story where adding another weapon to the picture improved things at all.

On a side note, I think there is a LOT to be said for having a strong sense of situation awareness and how to do risk management on the street. I spent a good amount of time years ago living in Nairobi and I was one of the few people in my circle of friends who didn’t have a gun in their face at any point. I’m not trying to say I’m somehow special, I think that can happen to anyone but I wish people didn’t have their entire personal security model centered around having a weapon because it’s actually a really shit plan in real life.

Edit: I don’t know if you’re familiar with Robert Young Pelton but he is a war correspondent wrote a book called the worlds most dangerous places which is part adventure travel guide and part how to stay safe in actually honest to god dangerous places and situations. He just started a podcast based on that book and I think you might get something out of this: https://youtu.be/3dhh5_oJsqQ?feature=shared

If someone is intentionally pulling a gun on you, you should expect they intend to kill you with it, and respond appropriately. And if having a chambered weapon is as dangerous as you say, then you should also maybe expect, they might accidently set the gun off at any time. That's a no from me dog. I'm not just going to pray they only just want my shit, and don't intend to use it to rape my wife, or my child, or even me, or just to kill me for the lolz.

And yeah I've been in the third world, including Syria. I think the penalty for me having one in Syria was probably the death penalty (LOL!), I didn't give a shit. Some people did shoot at me, I survived.

But this is again what I am saying. Of course you can get yourself into such a state where you immediately go to the worst possible case scenario and get yourself so worked up where the only logical conclusion is that you need a weapon with one in the chamber at all time… just in case.

But that is just being scared and has nothing to do with actually assessing and managing risk.

A modern striker fired pistol that is designed properly (like glock gen 3+) is not going to go off unless you pull the trigger. I don't understand why you wouldn't carry it chambered, if you are going to carry. You shouldn't be pulling it out of the holster unless you are about to shoot someone with it, at which point, why just stand around racking it and hoping it doesn't jam?

I mean honestly, you and I are coming from very different places mentally. There’s just no scenario where I would be walking the streets in the US doing my normal day to day shit with a weapon to begin with.

I understand that’s become a very normalised thing to do there but is something that would get you laughed out of the bar in pretty much the rest of the English speaking world.

Again, I don’t know what to tell you other than I think there is a paranoid culture problem here where everyone is just terrified of everything all the time and nobody seems to know how to step back from the edge and deescalate or again like I keep saying learning how to ACTUALLY judge and manage risk. It’s an actual skillset that will serve you much much better than a weapon ever will.

The same thing goes for just learning how to not panic if you find yourself in a sketchy situation. The ability to remain calm is hands down the most impressive and helpful thing I’ve ever seen from the actually dangerous people I know and have spent time with in some capacity or another.

> I would recommend you take an entry level CCW class.

I had to take one to get my Texas License To Carry (at the time a concealed carry license). I don't know what they teach in other states, but Texas has strict regulations on when and how to use deadly force. Including when to point a gun at someone.

Basically, not having a round chambered means you're too late to do anything with that gun other than use it an expensive blunt instrument -- or -- be possibly charged for brandishing/intimidation. Either you are being approached/charged at and are in immediate danger of bodily harm or you are not. If you are, you better have a loaded round ready to discharge.

Ofc, there is also the use of deadly force to protect the immediate and active threat to personal property. No real immediate need to have one loaded here. However, I don't think people carry because they are waiting to shoot someone trying to steal their car or other property under the Castle Doctrine. Which if someone is willing to kill another who is stealing their parked empty car, there are bigger talks to have other than if they are carrying with a load round or not. I don't usually keep a round chambered at home, my siblings have offspring that come around and even though it's a bit of a family tradition to learn to learn gun safety and shooting before age 10 -- I still don't care for the thought of a fully loaded gun not in my immediate possession.

I won't share my opinions of your statement, but I've seen no information on whether or not there was a round in the chamber at the time of the incident.

Regardless, depending on the situation and specifically in the USAF, you are ordered to either carry with a round in the chamber or not, and you'd damned well follow those orders.

It's beside the point, but I imagine, based on my own first hand experience, that USAF Security Forces typically carry without a round in the chamber, in most situations. I did Weapons Courier duty and I was ordered to carry a round in the chamber and be "locked and loaded" at all times.

It would be wild news if a firearm was able to discharge without a round in chamber. Even without information, for it to discharge there must be a a round in chamber.

Marine Corps order for MP and armed guard standard is round in chamber, weapon on safe, slide forward, hammer down. It stands to reason that is the standard case for all military LEO.

All that to say, anyone who says you shouldn't have a round in chamber is living in a fantasy world.

> anyone who says you shouldn't have a round in chamber is living in a fantasy world.

That was historically a very common military rule, and AFAIK it's still common worldwide, just not in US.

IDF is particularly famous for having empty chamber as the standard protocol, which is why this is often colloquially known as "Israeli carry". And you can say a lot of things about IDF, but one thing for sure: they have operational experience.

USAF SF is probably different (if SOP hasn't changed) because USAF SF gets so little time in training. USAF SF also ironically seem to have the largest numbers of disciplinary issues. Your average Marine, even a non-rifleman, has far better firearms training than a USAF SF airman.

Disclaimer: I was not SF. I was merely surrounded by them in a very high security environment. :-)

Yeah, when I carried a 9mm on watch on US Navy bases, I always had a round in the chamber, weapon safe, slide forward, hammer down. I think it makes sense if you're doing concealed carry in a civilian context to not chamber a round, but if you're on watch and responsible for responding, I think it's different.

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