Always Believe that the gun is Loaded! by John Bobo

Whenever I finish hunting with my pump shotgun, I always pump it, point it to the ground and pull the trigger to hear the click, and then put it in the scabbard.  On one such dove hunt I was having trouble ejecting the third shell.  However, when I finished I went through the same exercise and put the gun back in the case.  A few days later I took the gun, and a reel that I was having trouble with, to a gun and reel shop for repair.

I told the owner the problem I was having with the gun, and he said “well, your barrel is too far forwards and your choke just needs tightening down,” and he pushed the barrel down,  crewed it down a few turns and handed it back to me.  I was standing there talking to him, telling a few hunting and fishing lies, with the butt of the gun on the counter, and just nonchalantly pulled the trigger, and blew a hole in his air conditioning duct above me.

His wife started screaming, bb’s were falling all around us, sheetrock dust was all over us – I was flabbergasted!  I would have sworn the gun wasn’t loaded.   I would have bet my entire paycheck on it, because I was the guy who pulled the safety check on it and put it in the case.  But, as you experts have probably guessed, there was a shell hung up inside, and when the owner pushed the barrel down and tightened up the choke, it released the shell and sent it straight to the chamber – ready to fire … and unfortunately it did!

Of course, I offered to pay for the damages – not knowing where I would get the money.  A week or so later I went back to pick up my reel, and as I walked through the door, the owner asked “You don’t have a gun, do you?”  As it turned out, his insurance took care of everything, but I have kept that lesson learned to this day.