How does one get a bead on the Bird (sight) if he only was going by sound. The reports stated from eyewitnesses that he had a visual. The reports originally were all over the map, even going so far as to say that the VP was shot, most of the Media reports were scatterbrained half a$$ed reporting. Anything can make Bushes rustle, and Dick cheney is an experienced Hunter, and knows this.
Quail are instinctively, and incredibly, good at evasive action. A bird 20 feet in the air can drop to near-ground level in micro-seconds, and if there's any brush on the ground a hunter can drop the barrel and shoot without knowing at what he's really shooting. It's bad form, and very poor judgement to do so, but it can happen. I'd say its a form of bird denial panic. "It's getting away!" If you don't get your bird when it's well up above you, you just have to forget about it and move on. BTW, what happened to Cheney today is not unusual.
Well, "sound shot" is a fairly broad category of "slob hunting skill-set". Hear bushes rustle, turn head, see something moving in the brush, reflex shot, *boom*, "you got game". Or something.
As to his skills, well, skills are one thing. Being sloppy is another. Some can know all the rules, and still screw up when the adrenaline gets ahead of the cortex.
The main thing is being enough of a VIP to get away with that kind of "accident".
I've read more "hunting accident" stories than I could possibly recall over the years, and I've never heard of it being "the victim's fault.")
As a rule, the shooter will be very lucky if he walks away from the experience without at the very least a major part of his walking-around-money being shuttled to his lawyer's bank account.