Posted on 10/28/2008 6:06:17 AM PDT by politicalmerc
WESTFIELD, Mass. (Oct. 27) - With an instructor watching, an 8-year-old boy at a gun fair aimed an Uzi at a pumpkin and pulled the trigger as his dad reached for a camera. It was his first time shooting a fully automatic machine gun, and the recoil of the weapon was too much for him. He lost control and fatally shot himself in the head.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.aol.com ...
This wouldn’t happen if we had gun education. If people understood guns, caliber and the prinicles of gun use. If people understood how guns worked.
We have an uneducated group here.
The guy who gave the gun to the 8 year old was a CERTIFIED GUN INSTRUCTOR!!! I just can’t deal with this story...
What’s wrong with a two-man chain saw for a warm up ?
Perhaps he didnt know the ability level of an 8 year old.
I started with BB guns at the age of five and was allowed to shoot 22 shorts through a single shot, break action rifle at the age of eight.
I was not allowed to fire a higher power rifle until I started hunting with shotguns at the age of 11 (started shooting target and clays with 410’s at the age of eight) and showed that I could handle the weapon and it's recoil safely.
I have done the same with my children and they not only handle any weapon with respect they are very safe and can be trusted with them.
Was there an open bar at this gun show? Because acts of stupidity this incredible are usually accompanied by lots of alcohol.
I'm sorry, but that's about as poor of judgment as you can get.
Unfortunately, involuntary man slaughter charges are probably on the way for the two adults.
The lie in the headline is that the accident took place at a “Gun Show.”
Gun shows are indoor events where guns and other goods are bought and sold. There is no shooting, and no loaded guns. This accident took place at a shooting range. This was not a “gun show” tragedy” but a “gun range” tragedy.
The actual event, as noted later in the article, was: Machine Gun Shoot and Firearms Expo at the Westfield Sportsman’s Club, co-sponsored by C.O.P. Firearms & Training.
I grew up with guns in the house (loaded and hanging on the wall) and in a family that hunted year around. That said, my father didn't feel it was appropriate for me to fire my first firearm until I was 10. He would have NEVER allowed me to fire an automatic weapon until I was in my teens.
I have an 8 & a 10-year-old, and there is absolutely NO WAY I think that it would be acceptable to allow them or any of their friends to fire an UZI on their own.
To me this is like throwing them behind the controls of a bulldozer to get some cute pictures of them knocking down a tree.
Good post. Remember the idiot who committed suicide and murdered his little daughter by having her flying planes at the age of five or six?
Jessica Dubroff. 7 years old.
When I was 19 I thought I was the smartest man on earth. I'm 41 now and I know what to be afraid of! The boast is literally correct: "I have forgotten (now) more than a 19 year old knows!" That is at least true of the 19 that I was....
No offense to our younger members. Trust me, I can't explain it to you, and there is no way for you to understand. Talk to me in 20 years.
We really need to stop involving kids in dangerous activities to make them the "youngest" to cheat death in some way.
No offense, but they died because they took off into unsafe weather conditions to try and meet a media schedule. That kind of crash kills people every year, and it’s stupid and preventable, but it didn’t have anything to do with the girl’s age.
Did I read somewhere that the kid was already an experienced shooter with calibers much more powerful than 9mm? I could have sworn I saw that in an article somewhere.
I’m withholding judgment on the father and instructor until I hear more. And I certainly won’t say letting children fire automatic weapons is necessarily a good idea. But if the child were able to handle with full-power handguns and rifles safely and competently, I don’t know that it’s a stretch to let him squeeze off a couple bursts from a 9mm Uzi. Another article I read said that other kids were firing it that day, obviously with no ill effects.
I'm amazed that either is tolerated in Massachusetts.
Of course not.
An experienced adult pilot with years of inclement flight-time logged and a 7 year old girl who has been flying for a short time as a gimmick are evenly matched when it comes to flying into a storm.
How silly of me not to realize.
I’ve been shooting since I was five. When my dad was teaching me, he held the gun back with his hands when I held it because he knew there’d be recoil.
The same method I’ve used with my daughters...all without incident for years.
The father had no idea what he was doing and I’m surprised the guy “renting” the UZI didn’t. I won’t hammer the father because I’m sure he has no interest in living either—God intervene he and his family.
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