Not good press

[Yellow Bear]

Shooting accident in Cornwall - 3 seriously injured - did someone go berserk or was it just poor gun safety? - salutary warning.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cornwall-41973397

[kaunda]

Three ' huntsmen " ? .  What sub/editor let that one go ?

[welshwarrior]

Well police spokesman said shoot with a pellet gun. 

So all very accurate reporting again

[Zetter]

On one of the local press pages the son of one of the injured parties stated to the press that a gun had shot a low flying bird in line with some of the other competitors on the trial from about 20 meters away.

http://www.cornwalllive.com/news/cornwall-news/man-shot-almost-killed-hunt-767501

 

Sure more will come out soon but not  great if that was the case

 

 

[scotslad]

To be honest I can see how it could happen.

Walked up shooting is far more dangerous than standing on a peg/in a butt/ pigeon hide as safe arcs of fire are always changing plus walking over rough ground sometimes isn't easy and usually shooting at lower birds.

The same on fox drives u need sensible guns who won't get excited and shoot heavies towards u

If it was a FT u generally have a whole load of folk in the line from judges, handlers, stewards, game cariers,with another load closely behind then u may have the 'red flag' and the gallery/spectators further behind again or off to the side, so u really have to have ur wits about u and be very sure where the safe shots are before u ever think about lifting the gun

But the folk who were shot may also not have been in the right place either, so while the gun will be to blame so other folk do put them selves in a dodgy situation.

I've shot for a few training days and sometimes the handlers can be like herding cats, they may be good with dogs but have very little 'game sense', I've had handlers in FT walk right in front of me just as there dog enters cover looking keen and then moan when I haven't lifting the gun to shoot the flush

 

It should serve as a good wake up call to many esp if walking up to really make sure there safe at all times

[wymberley]

Because events such as these are rare, we do need to learn from them. Hopefully, when it's all settled down we'll get to know precisely what happened.

[marsh man]

We have walked up Woodcock days which are run very similar to a field trial , one gun , one beater, one picker up , one beater then another gun , everyone walk in a straight line and when a bird is shot the line stop until the bird have been retrieved before the order is given to carry on ,  we have a policy where only shots are taken in front and on no account  would they allow anything taken sideways or behind .

I have found over the years , the one day where you need to clamp down on safety is a Beaters day , guns tend to get excited and some of them are not used to shooting in company , we don't want to spoil any ones day but safety is paramount and by placing some iffy guns in the right place the day normally run fairly smoothly and the keeper must do a sigh of relief when its all over .