There's safety in these numbers

There's safety in these numbers Steady decline in firearm-related hunting accidents highlights value of training classes

The stereotype of hunting as a dangerous activity in which participants regularly fall victim to unsafe use of firearms took another severe blow with the recent release of a report on Texas hunting-related accidents.

This past calendar year saw fewer firearms-related hunting accidents in Texas than any year since 1966, when Texas Parks and Wildlife Department began maintaining detailed records.

In 2004, TPWD wardens documented 29 hunting-related accidents, including four fatal ones, among the state's more than one million licensed hunters.

Those 29 hunting-related accidents continue a long-term reduction of such accidents in the state.

State hunting safety officials and hunter education instructors point to a concerted effort to teach firearms safety as part of a mandatory hunter education program in Texas as one of the reasons for the decline in accidents and fatalities.

1988 a pivotal year In 1966, TPWD began a program whereby they collected standardized information on all hunting-related accident involving firearms. Game wardens collect most of the information, and it comes from their work and other law enforcement investigations of the incidents.

When the monitoring began, those wardens had a lot of incidents and a sobering number of fatalities to report.

In the 10-year period 1966-75, Texas annually averaged 84.5 hunting-related firearms accidents.

During that same period, hunting-related firearms fatalities annually averaged 23.4.

In 1988, the Texas Legislature made hunter education training mandatory for all hunters born on or after Sept. 2, 1971. Since the program began, almost 700,000 people have passed the courses taught by hundreds of volunteer, TPWD-certified instructors.

Hunting accidents and fatalities began dropping almost immediately after mandatory hunter education took effect.

Impressive drop During the past 10 years (1995-2004), Texas has annually averaged 40.9 hunting accidents and 4.3 fatalities, according to TPWD's most recent report.

That's a decline of more than half in the annual number of hunting-related accidents. Fatalities have dropped by more than 80 percent.

Just as impressive, the rate of hunting-related accidents has fallen to record lows in the past few years.

From 1966 through 1975, TPWD documented 9.46 accidents for every 100,000 hunting licenses sold.

For 1995-2004, that fell to an accident rate of 3.61 per 100,000 hunting licenses.

In 2004, the rate was 2.7 firearms-related accidents per 100,000 licenses. That's the lowest on record.

The four fatalities in 2004 marked an increase from 2003, when two fatalities were recorded, the lowest fatality count on record.

To put that in perspective, Texas has averaged about 40 fatalities in boating accidents during the past few years.

•Texas hunters seem to be taking the "guns and alcohol don't mix" message very seriously. Alcohol was determined to be a factor in only one of the 29 hunting accidents recorded in 2004. It was determined to be a factor in one of the 44 accidents in 2003, and one of the 35 accidents in 2002.

•Almost all of the accidents involved someone violating a cardinal rule of hunter safety. The most common cause of an accident was classified as "victim covered by shooter swinging on game."

An example is someone swinging on a rising quail or passing dove, shooting, and the shot hitting a person in the line of fire. Such a mistake accounted for nine of the 29 accidents.

•Dove hunting, with 11 accidents (38 percent of the total) was the activity with the highest number of accidents. Deer hunting was second with six accidents, or about 20 percent of the total.

•Deer hunting, which typically involves high-power, center-fire rifles, usually accounts for most of the fatal accidents. In 2004, three of the four fatalities occurred during deer hunts. The other occurred during a hog hunt.

•During 2004, the average age of the person responsible for a firearms-related accident was 27. Those 20-29 years old accounted for almost a quarter of hunting accidents. •Annually, about a third of the accidents are self-inflicted, and almost always involve breaches of basic firearms safety. •Only three of the people determined to have been the shooter in the 29 accidents had taken and passed the state's hunter education course.

Like driving a car, everyone thinks they can handle a firearm better than the next guy. In fact, training should be mandatory not only for hunters, but any firearm acquirer, just as it is to drive a car

Try to base your reasoning as if this was a free country. It's not the government's responsibility to see that you are educated or allowed to own something. The penalties for accidents are stiff enough so those involved do understand how serious an accident can be.

The problem is too many people have been able to write off serious accidents as only an accident. In other words, nothing they could have prevented. It's the same as the person who drives too fast for conditions or cuts in and out of traffic. If they killed someone from their gross neglect, it was only an "accident". Lawsuits and jail time have changed that to some degree.

You are living in another century (19th!)and insisting that the government should have absolutely no role whatsoever in controlling the use of firearms endangers all gun owners because the alternative is no guns.

By this way of thinking we should not need driver's licences or maybe even pilot's licences either - just wait until the airplane crashes, put what is left of the pilot in jail forever, and trust that will disuade the next guy from flying dangerously. It's not realistic. Mandatory training is reasonable and would be an influence to help you keep your guns.

Something else, accidents do happen. If a guy has never been trained in how to clear a misfeed in a semi-auto, doesn't control his muzzle and has his finger on the trigger at the same time (I have seen this happen many, many times) and kills his buddy, in fact it is an accident. What do you want to do, call it murder 1st and give the guy 50 years?? Wouldn't it be better to ensure he was trained and prevent the accident in the first place?

I think the year is 1791 to be exact. That's when that little pesky "Shall not be infringed" phrase was written.

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