In the spirit of my earlier post concerning TPWD Accident Reports, what close calls that could have resulted in an injury or fatal accident have you experienced while in the outdoors? After all, I'm sure there are many more close calls that happen every hunting season that are never reported. Still, they offer lessons learned to those who experience them, as well as those who hear about it.

I remember the time I was crossing a creek on an ATV and started up the bank on the other side. I had done a brake job on it about a week earlier and had forgotten to adjust the brakes, meaning I had no breaks when the ATV started to roll backwards down the bank. Thankfully, a friend was standing on the bank and quickly grabbed the front of the ATV so that it would not tip back and over as I rolled back into the creek bed.

And while I wasn't in camp at the time, I remember when a fellow hunter was lucky not to be injured when he was backing his ATV out of the bed of his truck. One of the tailgate cables snapped, sending him and the ATV over the side of the ramps. Ever since it happened I always pull my ATV out the back of my truck by hand and would NEVER consider climbing on and backing it out. I also invested in longer ramps that are sloped at the top and look for spots to unload where the angle of the ramps will be less.

none specific to me but a few pretty close to home.

My dad used to hunt with a guy that carried a old lever 30-30, they got in the truck and dad asked him if he had unloaded his rifle. the guy gave him a look and said of course I did, cocked the hammer and pulled the trigger ... BOOM ...evidently he was mistaken. bullet hit his friend in the leg above the ankle. Dad rushed him to the hospital about 20 minutes away. He always walked with a pretty noticeable limp the rest of his life. Every time dad saw him, he would ask when he was going to pay for the new bell housing in his truck where the bullet ended after going thru his leg.

My wife and sister in law decided they wanted to go to my FIL ranch to hunt. My FIL loaned them his old Springfield conversion 30-06. When they got to the ranch, they got out and my SIL loaded the gun and as she was getting the rifle out of the truck ... BOOM ... wasn't familiar with that type of safety ... only blew a hole in the floor board but about deafened them for a while. Of course my SIL was not very happy with my FIL and gave him a piece of her mind upon getting back to the house.

Did she think the magazine cutoff was the safety? I could see people seeing the ON and thinking it's on safe.

Too long a tale to tell, but I've had a too close for comfort event that stays with me, umm 40+ years later and probably will the rest of my life, that almost resulted in a disaster in several ways.

IMO S#$T@ happens to all of us unless we pay attention any time and every time a loaded weapon is in the mix. Occasionally I still get nightmares thinking about the "event" sometimes when a similar weather pattern starts the memory all over again...and why I usually have hunted alone these last 30-40 years. God may have forgiven me but I won't ever forgive myself if I am so involved ever again with the problems in front of me that I ignore the past memories of what I almost did something that was so stupid it would have cost me a best friend's life...and maybe my own life too.
Ron

My closest call is when I got in a pop up with a friend on a hunt where I had tagged out already. He was to my left and had supposedly just emptied his 300 mag with muzzle break shooting doe’s. It’s pretty cold that afternoon and he took the gun and sits the stock on the ground between his legs with the muzzle pointed between our heads like an idiot while removing the magazine to reload to shoot more doe’s. I was glassing the field watching where the deer had stopped on the other side not having a clue the gun was pointed like that when it went off blowing out my ear drum and making me fall sideways out of the chair. I thought I was dead at that instance with it knocking the sense out of me but when I figure out I hadn’t been shot I look over and my buddy's not moving on the ground, fearing he was dead I laid on the ground for what seemed like a month but in reality it was only a few seconds when I noticed him starting to move. I get up and the concussion had obviously only knocked him out or knocked him silly like it did me and he was in a state of confusion as I was asking him if he was ok when he said I’m not sure.

After the shock and adrenaline wore off and we determined we were just deaf but otherwise ok we figured out the dip [censored] obviously still had a round in the barrel with the safety off and the coveralls he had on were bunched up around his knee’s from sitting and that little piece sticking out had hit the trigger making it go boom with him having it between his legs. I hated that SOB for a long time and to this day I will not get in a stand with anyone other than my wife or dad and I’m super skeptical about who I’m around with a gun out in general. I simply don’t trust people with firearms around and I’m half deaf over that asshats stupidity.. Bad things can happen in the blink of an eye,

Back in college, I was hunting one morning out at Alazan WMA. I walked in with my climber on my back, and knew the general area I was headed to. I got to where I wanted to be, found a tree and started climbing. I got about 10 or 12 feet up and the tree started to lean back towards me. It took me a second to realize what was going on, but then it hit me... I was climbing a dead tree.

At this point, I thought I was a goner and started praying in between thoughts of, "I'm dead. I am so dead." Well, by the grace of God, I made it back to the ground. I found a good LIVE tree a short distance away, and got back up in time for shooting hours.

At the end of the hunt, I got down and checked out the tree I first climbed. Yup, dead as a door nail and rotten to the core.

Moral of the story: don't climb a dead tree.

My closest call is something still pending. This happened on my 7 acre property where we tend bees. It is mostly open land with a smattering of big trees and I let the weeds get high over most of the property for the wildflowers for the bees. However, we have the bee yard and then several areas where we have planted flowering shrubs that need to be mowed regularly for access to water the plants, etc. While tending bees and MOWING (for an hour) with a pushmower in my WHITE bee suit, part of the time in clear view of my neighbor's property, I had stopped to check on how feeding bees was going. Before I started to mow, I had put feeders on the bees and I was checking the hives to see that nothing was leaking, etc. The hives are located behind a stand of trees so that they are not visible from the neighbors or roads. That is when I heard the first shot, but because I still had on hearing protection, I did not realize how close it was. However, I was recording the bees with my phone for later notes on the status of the hives and later heard the shot much better when reviewing my videos, including the zip of the bullet that undoubtedly passed within feet of me. So at the time, I did not realize I was being endangered.

Then I heard a bunch more shooting, which is not unusual for the area but the direction of the shots was unusual and so I walked around to see what was going on to the north where the shots originated. Sure enough, I saw three guys standing around an old UTV and chatting, but facing west, where I assumed they had targets. So I thought I would get some video of the guys shooting to share with my wife to let her know that the neighbors had set up a range next door. Then one dude picked up a rifle, swung it in my direction and started blasting. I turned tail as soon as the rifle was leveled at me and ran for the cover of my truck and the 3rd round went zipping by me. I have the rifle being pointed at me on video and the audio captured the shots including the bullet going by me.

I stayed behind my truck on the phone with 911 as several magazines were fired in my direction and more bullets whizzed by.

Long story short, these were guests of my neighbor, not that I had any idea who my neighbor was. They had a new rifle and wanted to shoot it and had set up targets on the fence and were using MY property (which has a slight rise compared to theirs) as a backstop. The distance from where they were standing when they started shooting to where I was standing was approximately 100 yards.

These yahoos told the investigator that they didn't think anyone was on my property and that it would be okay to shoot into it. That statement shocked me. They didn't "think" anyone was on my property, so it was okay to shoot into it. What kills me is that my neighbor's property is bigger than mine and they had places on the property where they could shoot, but they chose to shoot at targets along the fence I had installed into MY property.

All of the individuals were adults.

My close calls with a gun have resulted from me doing something stupid or someone I was hunting with doing something stupid

One was in cleaning a rifle I checked the breach and did not see she’ll closed the breach and pulled the trigger and boom

Another time a friend and I had been out shooting a revolver
One of the revolvers would not fire when cocked we came in from shooting and he grabbed the revolver that would not shoot and pulled trigger without cocking and it fired. Thankfully it was pointed at the ground.

The third instance was a hunter taking a rifle off of a gun rack by the muzzle and hung trigger and sent a round down his shirt sleeve.

Very fortunate no one was hurt or killed

All three were careless and stupid

I'm convinced that if hunters would make it a rule to wait until they're in the stand to load their firearm, and always unload it before they leave, many if not a majority of shooting-related hunting accidents would be avoided. Leave the magazine full if you must but leave the chamber empty until you're actively hunting. Leaving firearms loaded when it isn't necessary is no doubt a primary reason why so many hunting accidents occur around vehicles.

HOLY CRAP man!! I'm glad you're okay....that sounds absolutely terrifying! It's amazing just how stupid some people are.

My closest call was dove hunting. My aunt decided to let my little cousin fire her 20 gauge down into the tank. I was on the other side. I started moving as soon as that little girl got ahold of the gun, and she fired into the brush right behind me.

There are places with shooting benches and spotting scopes where you can pay a very reasonable fee to practice your shooting skills and check your scope. And yet, around 10am on most Opening Day Mornings, the rural countryside is covered with the sounds of people slinging hot lead. And many of them are trying to find out why they missed that buck an hour or two earlier.

After 60 years of hunting big game and small game with various family, friends and their associates The situation where I have seen a high potential for accidental shootings is when you arrive at your hunting location and folks grab their guns and start loading!!!
The careless pointing and swinging of muzzles as magazines and chambers are loaded is hair raising to say the least.
It is at this moment one can see the lack of safety awareness on the part of certain members of the group!!!
If you value your future it is at this time a serious reminder of your concern may be a life saver!!!

Maybe it's because they are concentrated into one location, but I have seen far more dumb s$#t happen at public shooting ranges than in the field. And I"ve seen my share in both places.

Just last Sunday, the kid and I were at a range getting her some practice in before youth weekend when a group of 10-12 guys show up, walk right around the office where you're supposed to check in first, and onto the firing line, all carrying rifles, about half of them not even in a case, during a cease-fire no less. They simply care that there were rules, or that anyone else was there, it was all about them. The range officer quickly got a hold on the situation once he found the two of the group who spoke English and it was uneventful from that point on, but I was nervous the whole time they were there.I wouldn't even go downrange with them there. They all shot about 100rnds or so from their rifles as quickly as they could, then departed just about as quickly as they'd arrived.

As for close calls in the field, I've yet to have one where I feared for my life. My uncle did fall out of a tree while hanging a stand a few years back. Hit a couple of branches on the way down and cracked a vertebrae in his neck. Laid there til he regained consciousness and lived to tell the tale. He was lucky, he was there alone and not expected home until the next evening so nobody would have missed him for about 30hrs.

People often view hunting on public land as far more dangerous than private land. And yet, accidents on public land are far less common than private for probably the very same reason - People are more watchful of their actions when they know others are in the area. Also, the presence of range officers to enforce a set of rules helps protect people from themselves.

Close calls - forgetting the toilet paper, lesson learned - bring an extra pair of socks.

Had a few close calls years ago involving duck boats hitting logs in the dark on rivers. Now I duck hunt ponds. I pray I never have to experience any firearm accidents/negligence. For that reason I am super selective with who I will hunt with and typically prefer to hunt alone for that reason. I am a real butt head when it comes to firearm safety. I do not tolerate carelessness with firearms.