Shooting death and injury on Alec Baldwin movie set.

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Brian D.
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Re: Shooting death and injury on Alec Baldwin movie set.

Post by Brian D. »

If that particular gun was mechanically defective, wouldn't that fact have been mentioned by now?
Quit worrying, hide your gun well, shut up, and CARRY that handgun!

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Re: Shooting death and injury on Alec Baldwin movie set.

Post by schmieg »

docachna wrote:I'm not familiar with older pistols (not even certain what he was using), but in talk radio discussions here in Nashville, some self-proclaimed "experts" have insisted that if the hammer was partially pulled back, and then dropped before locking at half-cock, the cylinder would not have rotated enough to put a cartridge and its primer under the firing pin, and the previous cartridge (if any) would have been past the firing pin, thus, putting us back to the theory that the only way it could have fired was via a trigger pull.

Talk amongst yaselves..............
And they know how many times he did this? For that matter, there could have been a live round under the hammer. Since the movie people cleaned things up after it happened, including removing the spent brass from the gun, the investigators don't know anything for sure.
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Re: Shooting death and injury on Alec Baldwin movie set.

Post by drc »

schmieg wrote:
docachna wrote:I'm not familiar with older pistols (not even certain what he was using), but in talk radio discussions here in Nashville, some self-proclaimed "experts" have insisted that if the hammer was partially pulled back, and then dropped before locking at half-cock, the cylinder would not have rotated enough to put a cartridge and its primer under the firing pin, and the previous cartridge (if any) would have been past the firing pin, thus, putting us back to the theory that the only way it could have fired was via a trigger pull.

Talk amongst yaselves..............
And they know how many times he did this? For that matter, there could have been a live round under the hammer. Since the movie people cleaned things up after it happened, including removing the spent brass from the gun, the investigators don't know anything for sure.
Including any actionable fingerprints on the cartridge.

You can fire a true SAA (or an exact clone) by hitting the hammer if there is a live round in the chamber. That is why the old dead guys always carried them hammer down on an empty chamber. The Ruger Vaqueros (and other modern versions of the design) have a hammer block to make them safe to carry.

At cowboy action shoots, you should see the degree of care that goes into a person leaving the firing line. The guns are unloaded in the presence of the "designated range officer for the shoot". The contestants immediately walk from the shooting stage to the inspection table and unload the gun, which is then inspected for empty chambers.

Since these guns start to rotate the cylinder as soon as the hammer starts to move back, I assume a sloppy,worn gun could have enough play to pull the hammer enough allow it to fall on a touchy primer. That is a lot of ifs though.
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Re: Shooting death and injury on Alec Baldwin movie set.

Post by catfish86 »

I don't have the link handy but on one of the write ups about Baldwins interview touched on the Sheriff or the prosecutor being asked about the trigger pull and the response was, "He was holding the weapon when it discharged." It's possible the prosecutor will do the right thing which is what we would face if we did that.
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Re: Shooting death and injury on Alec Baldwin movie set.

Post by TSiWRX »

catfish86 wrote:It's possible the prosecutor will do the right thing which is what we would face if we did that.
I'm keeping my fingers crossed, but not holding my breath. Hollywood Royalty is about as close to royalty as anyone in the US comes, these days. :cry: :x

Thanks, @drc , for educating me about Cowboy Action and these firearms. :)
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Re: Shooting death and injury on Alec Baldwin movie set.

Post by drc »

TSiWRX wrote:
catfish86 wrote:It's possible the prosecutor will do the right thing which is what we would face if we did that.
I'm keeping my fingers crossed, but not holding my breath. Hollywood Royalty is about as close to royalty as anyone in the US comes, these days. :cry: :x

Thanks, @drc , for educating me about Cowboy Action and these firearms. :)
If you are curious and just want to "check it out" there are C.A.S.'s at Tusco Shooting Range off US 250 (Midvale exit) south east of New Philadelphia. you would have to check the calender. it is kinda cool to watch a bit. I was going to get into CAS but subsequently learned it really wasn't for me (I am into long range - 1000 yard stuff) and more enjoy the precision of building up a rifle and then the loads, both smokeless and blackpowder (yes Quigley really would have been able to shoot like that, my BPCR rifles are 1000 yard guns with the soule type sights)

you would be able to see the different types of weapons, from old originals, to new copies, etc http://www.tuscorifle.org/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

the issue with the old Single Action Army (SAA the gun that most people identify with the old west) and a lot if not all of its brethren were the hammer mounted firing pins. if the hammer is lowered on a live round, the firing pin is resting on the primer. there is actually a loading sequence so that you end up lowering the hammer on an empty chamber
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Re: Shooting death and injury on Alec Baldwin movie set.

Post by schmieg »

drc wrote:the issue with the old Single Action Army (SAA the gun that most people identify with the old west) and a lot if not all of its brethren were the hammer mounted firing pins. if the hammer is lowered on a live round, the firing pin is resting on the primer. there is actually a loading sequence so that you end up lowering the hammer on an empty chamber
Load one round, skip one round, load the remaining four rounds, come back to full cock and lower the hammer on the empty chamber.
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Re: Shooting death and injury on Alec Baldwin movie set.

Post by Bruenor »

drc wrote:
If you are curious and just want to "check it out" there are C.A.S.'s at Tusco Shooting Range off US 250 (Midvale exit) south east of New Philadelphia. you would have to check the calender. it is kinda cool to watch a bit. I was going to get into CAS but subsequently learned it really wasn't for me
Something else that is fun to watch is Cowboy Mounted shooting

Wife and I went to watch one of these events and talk to people. All I said to the wife was, that looks really fun, but makes my shooting hobby look rather inexpensive in comparison. I mean they have to have actual horses in order to compete. I'll be sure to hit a couple of the events in Ashtabula Fairgrounds next year just to watch, because it is very entertaining.
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Re: Shooting death and injury on Alec Baldwin movie set.

Post by schmieg »

Bruenor wrote:
drc wrote:
If you are curious and just want to "check it out" there are C.A.S.'s at Tusco Shooting Range off US 250 (Midvale exit) south east of New Philadelphia. you would have to check the calender. it is kinda cool to watch a bit. I was going to get into CAS but subsequently learned it really wasn't for me
Something else that is fun to watch is Cowboy Mounted shooting

Wife and I went to watch one of these events and talk to people. All I said to the wife was, that looks really fun, but makes my shooting hobby look rather inexpensive in comparison. I mean they have to have actual horses in order to compete. I'll be sure to hit a couple of the events in Ashtabula Fairgrounds next year just to watch, because it is very entertaining.
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Re: Shooting death and injury on Alec Baldwin movie set.

Post by TSiWRX »

Whoa! Thanks for the info., @drc and @Bruenor!

https://medium.com/war-is-boring/cops-d ... 9b68c60583" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I've never been on a horse...at least not that I can remember (maybe when I was a young kiddo?). Neat!
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Re: Shooting death and injury on Alec Baldwin movie set.

Post by drc »

TSiWRX wrote:Whoa! Thanks for the info., @drc and @Bruenor!

https://medium.com/war-is-boring/cops-d ... 9b68c60583" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I've never been on a horse...at least not that I can remember (maybe when I was a young kiddo?). Neat!
We had horses for 30 years. They are incredibly strong animals. Especially when they go psycho. We were in the park riding (I don't remember which at this moment) and one of the horses saw a big rock (which actually was a bear in disguise just waiting to eat a helpless horse) out of the corner of its eye. Both horses (mine/my wife's) crouched down and jumped straight up in the air and rotated to look at the rock. The entire incident was over in the blink of an eye. This is just one episode.

It takes a long time to habituate them to being shot off of. In the beginning, it would be like that Olympic sport where you cuddle a cat in the crook of your arm and shoot your pistol from the other and then see how long you can hold on.

Back to the subject of our misery, err I mean the story. He shot the gun. He did something to make it go off. A SAA doesn't go boom by itself. It is not like a striker fired pistol where you can press on a mis-engineered bar and cause the striker to release. If the hammer was resting on a primer, it still needs something to initiate the forward inertia with enough velocity to set off the primer.

As far a sabotage, unless the entire cylinder was loaded, in my opinion, someone that understood the action of a SAA put a loaded round in the cylinder in the spot that would rotate into firing position. I cannot fathom him being handed the gun with the hammer cocked. Now it that is what happened and the trigger pull was light enough, he didn't even realize he fired it.

The sear design (at least an authentic design) is very simple and easy to lighten up. Back in the 50's Great Western made clones, including .22's on the .45 frame. My dad bought one and proceeded to mess with the sear to the point it would go off if a fly farted. The pieces had to be replaced.

As an aside, the set triggers on my BPCR rifles can actually be lightened up like that, ie: too loose. The test is to slam the block (breech mechanism) open and shut a couple times to make sure it won't go off.

here we go, the smoking gun (sorry bad pun)
In Baldwin's first TV interview since the fatal shooting, he said he didn't pull the trigger. "I let go of the hammer of the gun," Baldwin described. "And the gun goes off."
https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/h ... t-shooting" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

if he has the hammer back and it is not past half-cock (or the mechanism is damaged, or worn) there could enough inertia to fire the weapon, especially if there is enough slop so the cylinder didn't rotate.
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Re: Shooting death and injury on Alec Baldwin movie set.

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Rust armorers father gives interview and claims sabotage by crew member.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/articl ... taged.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
In his own interview with ABC's Good Morning America on Tuesday, Reed said his daughter had been around guns her 'whole life' and does as 'good a job' as he does. He has worked on films like 3:10 to Yuma and other Westerns involving guns.

He maintains that had Hannah been in the church set when Baldwin was given the gun, she would have checked it a final time and found the live round that was placed in it.

'That one time, they should have had her on set...she would have found it. She knows what to do. She does the job as good as I do now,' he said.

Lawyer Jason Bowles said they have proof someone sabotaged her and have given it to the sheriff.

'Sabotage is the most likely possibility, probability. A lot of motive there. Somebody wanted to cause a safety incident on set... nobody wanted anybody to be killed.

'We developed evidence of motive of that.
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Re: Shooting death and injury on Alec Baldwin movie set.

Post by bignflnut »

Tis the season for the fixers to formulate their narratives in the media.

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Re: Shooting death and injury on Alec Baldwin movie set.

Post by M-Quigley »

Bruenor wrote:Rust armorers father gives interview and claims sabotage by crew member.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/articl ... taged.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
In his own interview with ABC's Good Morning America on Tuesday, Reed said his daughter had been around guns her 'whole life' and does as 'good a job' as he does. He has worked on films like 3:10 to Yuma and other Westerns involving guns.

He maintains that had Hannah been in the church set when Baldwin was given the gun, she would have checked it a final time and found the live round that was placed in it.

'That one time, they should have had her on set...she would have found it. She knows what to do. She does the job as good as I do now,' he said.

Lawyer Jason Bowles said they have proof someone sabotaged her and have given it to the sheriff.

'Sabotage is the most likely possibility, probability. A lot of motive there. Somebody wanted to cause a safety incident on set... nobody wanted anybody to be killed.

'We developed evidence of motive of that
.
Regardless of sabotage or not, the fact that she wasn't on the set when it happened when that was supposed to be her job to be there is extremely suspicious. Was that her fault or someone else's?

I'm not usually a conspiracy theorist but the more stuff that comes out the more suspicious the case looks. It would be interesting to see what alleged evidence the lawyers have claiming someone had motive to cause a safety incident on the set that would result in someone dying. If it's true, is it motive for merely someone to die, or someone in particular? And who knew Baldwin would be so incompetent that he wouldn't have personally checked the gun or not violated the basic safety rules?

Actually strike that last question. :roll:
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Re: Shooting death and injury on Alec Baldwin movie set.

Post by Face »

One thing I have not seen mentioned here, or elsewhere except for one interview with a Hollywood prop guy/armorer. He stated once they give an actor a firearm if the cylinder is opened or the slide "racked" the prop master or whoever in charge at the time must immediately remove the gun from the actor and re-check.

So IF Baldwin checked the cylinder, he would then need to hand the gun to the armorer (or whoever) and start over.

In short - actors are instructed to NOT check any firearm personally.

No idea if this was that armorer's personal rules or an industry standard.
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