There are basic firearm safety rules that MUST be followed at all times. If you don’t want to shoot yourself or someone else, that is. If you don’t care about that, then you can do what these airmen from the Minot Air Force Base did at the Minot Rifle & Pistol Club, just north of Minot, North Dakota.

Officers say it does not appear to be an accidental discharge of a weapon, but a situation where the people who were firing the guns were not aware of where everybody was at the time the shots were fired.

The result? One airman was shot multiple times in the legs. That’s simply Not Cool.

Rule #1: Keep your firearm pointed in the safest possible direction.

Rule #2: Keep your finger off the trigger and out of the trigger guard until you are ready to shoot.

Rule #3: Be sure of your target, AND BEYOND.

There’s a reason for those rules… and all of us shooters should all remember them at all times.

It only takes a split second to make a life-changing mistake like this. Fortunately the airman will apparently make a full recovery, so the shooter doesn’t have to have the death of his fellow airman on his conscience.

Maybe you remember the case of the training “accident” in Calgary in 2001… where Constable Darren Beatty was fatally shot in the head. How’d that happen? To quote the CBC news story on the case:

Can you imagine having to live with that mistake?

I can’t.

It only takes a few seconds to ensure you are being safe with your firearm.  Beats a lifetime of guilt for having killed someone, don’t you think?