I'm sure he knew that all guns are always loaded.
That did not help however.
Always keep your finger off the trigger until ready to shoot Always keep the gun unloaded until ready to useNRA Gun Safety Rules will keep you safer :
Always keep the gun pointed in a safe direction
The NRA does a great disservice to gun safety with this poorly thought out version of "Gun Safety Rules".
Obviously the dead man thought he was pointing the gun in a "safe direction" because he thought the gun was unloaded.
Obviously, the man's intention was to pull the trigger so he thought he was obeying the second rule.
Obviously, the third rule doesn't apply since he thought it was unloaded and didn't expect it to fire.
The Cooper rules (I think Cooper developed them) are better because they emphasize as the first rule that you must "treat every gun as if it is loaded".
You don't have to think it is loaded; you just have to treat it as if it was loaded. Cooper's rule 1.
If you treat a gun as if it is loaded, then obviously you don't point it at your own head because you don't wish to destroy your head. Cooper's rule 2.
If you treat a gun as if it is loaded, then obviously you don't put your finger on the trigger when it is pointed at your head because you don't intend to fire. Cooper's rule 3.
The absence of Cooper's rule 1 is a safety disaster and the NRA should be ashamed.
For completeness sake let's look at Cooper's rule 4; Be sure of your target and what is beyond it.
It was not that long ago that a young man who intended to commit suicide shot himself in the head. What he probably didn't intend was that the bullet exited his head and entered a girl standing next to him and killed her.
The NRA so-called safety rules are inadequate and therefor dangerous. I have taught gun safety to many of my friends and they don't touch anything until they can recite Cooper's rules back to me from memory.