That's almost exactly how I lost my S & W 629.
L
it's rapper name would be "Lil' Smitty".
I had a similar close call with my HK P7M8:
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While I was training my wife on my HK4, (with .380 barel installed) the old, oil-damaged Delrin recoil buffer "gave up the ghost". So -- I finished training her on my P7M8 and let her shoot the TX CHL qual with it. She shot within 10 points of max (250).
Then, I heard her on the phone with my our "#1 Son" that evening saying, "I love that P7 -- you just put that front white dot on target, line up the back white dots, and squeeze. Bullseye!"
I immediately went on a WWW search for a HK4 recoil buffer... ;-}