Since this one's so common, it'd be easier to just list especially egregious examples and subversions. (If you have to be told why this is a bad idea, you should never touch a gun.) If the person is really Too Dumb to Live, they may look into the barrel to see why it isn't working. note Automobile, aircraft, boat, and pesticide manufacturers are also exempt from the CPSA, since they all make things that, even when operating correctly, can still easily kill you - remember, that last one is poison. Note too that at least in the US all such recalls are voluntary firearm manufacturers are exempt from the Consumer Product Safety Act. But that does sort of prove the point about Hollywood's approach: the gun is being recalled because discharging when it's dropped is not considered normal operation in Real Life. and every now and then you will hear about gunmakers issuing safety recalls on guns that aren't drop-safe. Either way, the weapon will be out of action for at least a few minutes and may require partial disassembly. This frequently results in a hard jam and requires tools and time to clear - plus a safety check of the weapon afterwards to ensure it wasn't compromised if not in active combat. If the action continues to cycle and load a fresh round, the new round ends up stuffed partway inside the baseless case still stuck in the chamber. Rather than being pulled from the chamber by the extractor, the extractor rips off the base of the casing. To a very limited extent, this can be Truth in Television, as it's possible to jam a weapon so severely that serious work is needed to get it back in order, note One such scenario is a "telescoped" or double-feed round, which occurs when a round is fired but the case is structurally unsound. Then again, this fits in with the typical Hollywood approach to plans in general. Of course, if you're fighting for your life, this particular rule goes out the window. note Note that the recommended practice in the case of a misfire is to keep the weapon pointed in a safe direction for some time: the primer may, in fact, be accidentally slow-burning, and may go off without warning. If a round of ammo fails to fire, nobody in fiction simply pulls the trigger a second time if it's a revolver, or in the case of automatics, manually works the action to clear the dud so they can keep shooting. While very rare for modern ammunition made by reliable manufacturers, to the tune of about one-in-a-million or less, ammunition primers occasionally do not work as intended. Of course, in fiction, where guns never run out of ammo unless something takes it out of commission? A weapon-disabling jam may be the only way to make someone actually stop shooting without being killed.įor that matter, Hollywood treats a misfire as being the same as a jam as well. Even worse, the wielder, be they fresh-faced civilians who've never even seen a real gun before, or life-long hunters and trained soldiers who by all accounts should know better, will invariably discard the jammed weapon. Usual causes include a round failing to seat properly into the breech, a spent casing getting caught upon ejection (a condition known as "stovepiping"), poor-quality ammunition (insufficient pressure to cycle the weapon) or poor handling while shooting (not enough energy from the firing is absorbed by the hands/arms to let the slide or bolt move far back enough to cycle) Despite these errors taking only a second or two to correct in real life, when a firearm jams in a film or television show, such an event will render it completely useless. It's well-known that even the best guns still jam every now and then after repeated firing. That said, professionals who use weapons say there are only two classes of weapon users: those who have had a weapon accidentally discharge, and those who eventually will have a weapon accidentally discharge this is why basic Gun Safety says to treat any loaded firearm as if this actually is true, just in case you're dealing with a weapon that's damaged or just poorly-designed enough that it is. Never mind that practically all weapons designed after 1968 include a special mechanism to stop the hammer from falling unless the trigger is properly pulled, and that gunmakers had been adding them for a long time before that. It doesn't matter if it's a cheap Saturday Night Special or a professional quality, $1200 SIG-Sauer, count on this one. Bonus point if the bullet hits a Mauve Shirt or other expendable mook. Any jarring or dropping of a cocked, chambered gun will discharge it.Evidently, Hollywood doesn't trust the "big brands" when it comes to guns, as there are two things you can usually expect to see with firearms depicted in fiction:
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |