Dangers of a blugged barrel

[Guest canuck]

Here is an article that I found on another site..it might have been on here previously at sometime. It shows what can happen if you are not careful. There are two photos proceeding the story of the rifle. It reads obviously like an add for Weatherby but that is not why I posted it..just food for thought...becareful, you never know!

It was the second day of the PA antlered deer season in 1996. My father and I have been hunting out of our good friends' camp in Clarion Co. since I was old enough to hunt. I guess at that time I had been hunting there for over 20 years. It's a fun and safe hunting camp. We only hunt by the book. Nobody has ever been fined or even warned for a hunting violation out of our camp.

I had shot my buck on opening day, and was planning to leave camp on the second day by noon to return to work. I offered to drop my father off at his favorite hunting spot at dawn and pick him back up at 11:00AM. This would give me time to go back to camp, get a shower and help clean the camp before I had to make the 2-hour trip back to Pittsburgh. My fathers' usual hunting companion had some serious heath problems, so he didn't make it to camp, and my father had been having back problems. This made him reluctant to go out that second morning. So I said I would go with him. He said, "No, I'm OK. You get ready to leave. I'm just going in about 100 yards and sit down for a few hours." Well, this seemed like a good idea to me considering that my father had a knack of being in the right place at the right time. I said "OK, but if you shoot one, just dress it and leave it until I get there." That was the plan. My father always hunted deer with his Mark V in .300 Mag. that he purchased in the 1960's. He loves the way it performs and always talked about the knock down power and accuracy.

When morning came we ate breakfast then I drove my father to Cathers Run hollow on the border of Clarion, Jefferson and Forest Counties. My uncle and cousin followed and planned to hunt the day there. This is same hollow where I shot my first buck. My father and I have taken countless deer out of this hollow over the years. We all know this area better than any other.

After dropping off my father I returned to camp, and started packing and cleaning up for the trip home. I was just getting dressed after my shower when my uncles' car pulled up to the cabin. I opened the door and said, "Well, where's he at?" (I thought that someone had gotten a deer). My father got out of the passenger side of the car covered in mud. With a disgusted look on his face he pulled the old Weatherby out of the back seat and I couldn't believe what I saw. It looked like something out of a cartoon. I yelled "What happened!?" And here is the story he told.

I had dropped my father off just as it was getting light. As he was walking up the jeep trail, a herd of deer came down the mountain and passed in front of him at about 40 yards. He saw a rack on one of the deer, but he couldn't get a shot off in the small opening of the trail. He decided to get a better look by going off the trail down to the creek bottom where it opens up a little bit. As he got to the creek he was looking for movement and not paying enough attention to where he was stepping. At the top of the creek bank he stepped too close and slid down 10 feet to the creek. When he slid, the Weatherby must have been pointed toward the ground as he held on for dear life. When he stopped at the bottom of the bank, he realized that he was OK, but the Weatherby was covered in mud. He quickly wiped the mud off the side of the gun and was surprised to see the herd of deer running at him. The buck turned broadside and stopped 30 feet away across the creek. Without thinking about the mud, he raised the gun and the scope was clear. So he took the safety off and pulled the trigger. He said, "All I saw was smoke and deer tails." His adrenaline must have been working because he didn't realize what had happened until after he put another round in the gun and looked down at it. He sat back on the creek bank in amazement.

He said, "It all happened so fast that I just reacted and didn't think." It takes quite a bit to shake my father up. He was a patrolman for the Pittsburgh police department for over 30 years and has seen some bad stuff. When he walked into the cabin that morning, I knew he was shook up. He would be the last person, of all the people at our camp that anyone would expect to make a safety mistake. I'll remember the words he used to preach safety till the day I die. "You better be sure of where that bullet is going to go before you squeeze that trigger. Because once you do, you can never get it back."

After we all settled down, we took a look at the damage to the gun and couldn't believe my father was uninjured. The Weatherby 4X12 scope was broken. Its' crosshairs were gone. The trigger guard on the rifle was just barely hanging on. The mount screws on it had been sheared off, and the front action screw that holds the stock to the receiver was also sheared off. The stock had a hairline crack about 4 inches long, and the barrel was peeled back like a banana, 14 inches from the end. But the bolt and action were fine. The gunsmith who repaired the .300 said that the 9 lugs on the bolt saved my father from getting hurt. He said, "Anything but a Weatherby and you might not be alive."

At the same time my father bought his .300, his buddy bought one also. He had a semi-bull barrel put on it. My Father asked him what he did with the original barrel. It turns out that he had given it to a mutual friend, who is also a Pittsburgh police officer. My father called him and it turns out he kept it for 30 years in his closet. So my father and his buddy made a trade. My father got a new barrel for his gun, and his buddy (who owns the hunting camp) got a new wall ornament ? a barrel that looks like a banana! It hangs on the wall of the camp as a reminder to everyone. I now use the repaired gun and it shoots great.

I have enclosed two pictures. I'm the one in the green shirt with the weird look on his face. My father wouldn't pose for a picture

Scott R. Campbell

[Bill Arnott 2]

Great story canuck! A small piece of tape or saran wrap could have saved the day.

[Gone8to1248 158]

Condums work good also! That what we used in the service.