Hunter Fatally Shot Near Kremmling CO

vectordawg

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So who's fault is this?

 

DMTJAGER

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Every time I read of a incident where one hunter shoots another I am forced to recall a training film I had to watch when I traveled from IN to AZ to take the AZ hunter education course. It showed us films for the purpose or so they told us to teach us how to quickly positively identify a legal mule deer buck and and bull elk from a non legal buck or bull. They showed us five films each for mule deer and elk and I noticed in every film all of the bucks and bulls nice legal animals but none I would've likely shot. They showed us all the elk films first, then the mule deer films. I am not the least bit interested in hunting mule deer and they do not excite me at all. In the second film featuring mule deer I was pretty sure I saw a person standing in the woods behind the mullie walked not ran but walked directly in front by about 10-20 yards of in what looked like a Carhart jacket, the third film same thing but the this time I saw what I figured was a person standing not obscured by woods but wearing a blaze orange hat again that the mule deer walked past in front of. Now I was on to their true purpose. By the forth and fifth mule deer films I purposely ignored the the bucks and looked for people. In the forth and fifth films I spotted two people in dark hard to see street clothes and one person in a blaze hat in both films.

We were given a quiz sheet during the films and with pen we were required to mark each film as having ether a legal or non legal buck or bull.

Once done the instructors asked us to list on the sheet all other animals we saw in each film. Once we all finished that they asked us how many people we saw in each film and weather they were wearing blaze orange or not.

I have to tell you except for one young girl about best guess 14-15 and myself the rest of the entire entire class was shocked. None of the other students including my two friends saw any people in any of the films. And i saw no people in the elk films, no doubt due to elk are my absolute favorite animal to hunt or even watch.

The instructors collected our sheets then showed us the films again stopping them to point out all the people in each film. There were always three and in the case of the elk films sometimes four people in each, two in street clothes one in a blaze hat and one was in a blaze vest and hat.

The propose of the exercise became obvious to us all. The instructors wanted us to realize that you absolutely can be come so utterly fixated on a object that you will not see anything behind it and that's how hunters some times accidentally shoot each other. We become so completely fixated we make very bad even negligent decisions.

Lastly I once read an article in either ODL or F&S over 25 years ago that talked about a very real psychological phenomenon that your mind has the ability in instances when you so greatly greatly desire something your mind can actually manufacture a mirage of sorts and your subconscious can fool you into seeing an object or animal that is actually not there or the animal you do see is a vastly different than it actually is. This phenomenon is greatly enabled and compounded when the person in question has already in their immediate past seen the object or item they so greatly desirer like a huge buck they are pursuing in a drive.

The article sighted two just such instances. Both happened during deer drives one ended without anyone being harmed one ended in a horrible tragedy.

The first was a deer drive where a huge 180"+ whitetail buck was being continually jumped out of and it would run into cover in a series of thick hedgerows in otherwise wide open country. A group of two life long friends were standers at the end of a hedgerow as their friends drove the cover. One friend watched as a small basket racked buck emerged and started to head across open cover for the next hedge row. The one friend watched in complete surprise as his friends rose his rifle to his shoulder to fire. He asked why are you going to shoot such a small buck? he replied stop kidding around WYH is a matter with you? that's the monster buck biggest buck I have ever seen in my life! and he shot dropping the buck. Then the monster emerged and his friend promptly shot it. When they approached the small buck on the ground the man who shot it literally refused to accept it was the same buck. The man absolutely swore he 100% for certain saw the huge racked buck not a basket racked buck.


The second instance I do not recall the details well enough to tell here but it was an instance of a father mistaking his son for a huge buck he had seen only a few moments before during a drive and ended up fatally wounding his son then laying down next to his son and taking his own life.

My point is we as hunters we must realize our subconscious and emotions can and will have a profound impact on our conscious actions and a combination of our subconscious and emotions if allowed to be in control while firearm hunting can result in negligent firearm discharges and tragedy. We as hunters must never allow our desire to kill a huge trophy to supersede all else and suppress our ability to think and act rationally and responsibly, that's how hunting tragedies occur. I believe this very real fact plays a major roll in many instances of hunters shooting each other, non hunters or property like buildings or vehicles.
 
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DMTJAGER

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My brother, not very experienced, but experienced enough, discharged his rifle while unloading it this year while standing right behind me. Luckily he was pointing in a safe direction. It is unacceptable and totally the fault of the hunter.

I didn't hunt with him the rest of trip. He wouldn't take full responsibility for his actions.

He will not be going again.

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Sounds like your brother and mine are clones.
My brother not once but twice committed an unforgivably negligent act with a firearm.
First was about 35 years ago when I was but in my mid teens while he was proudly showing a group of his and my friends in our basement his new 6" S&W M29 44 magnum while exercising inexcusably horrible muzzle discipline sweeping most of the occupants of the room with the muzzle of the gun. I promptly and quite un diplomatically brought this to his attention, to which he replied:
What do you think I'm a F**#@ging idiot? of course it's unloaded!!!" and to prove this proceeds to as he thought dry fire and unloaded gun towards a shelf full of books he was standing next to and much to everyone's horror to gun go's BOOOM!!!
Second and LAST time I ever allowed myself to be around him if firearms were involved was at a public range shooting skeet with my clay bird thrower. Again he was exercising inexcusably horrible muzzle discipline this time with my relatively new shiny 12ga 870 Wingmaster. As he stood there with it pointing at my midsection with my back facing down range, I demanded he point the muzzle skyward and give me MY shot gun that vary second, he then poked me in the stomach with the muzzle out of reaction I grabbed the muzzle to move it away from me and he yanked back hard resulting in the 870 discharging.

I do not think any of the pellets that I had lodged under my skin were from the actual discharged shell but from the several shells that pellets from the originally discharged shell had hit the primers of the 12ga trap shells I had in my skeet vest I later found judging from the ruptured ends of the shells and holes in my vest had partially discharged while in my vest pocket. It could have been an unimaginably bad tragedy resulting in more than one person wooded. Thankfully I only ended up digging out a few #7-1/2 pellets from under my skin.

My friends had all they could do to stop me from literally beating my brother to a bloody mess which was no simple task as I'm a big guy and it was a multiple repeat effort on my part as I can assure you. As it was I refused to give him a ride home and made him go home in the other car my friends rode to the range in.
I have never allowed myself to be around my brother if firearms are involved ever again and never had much to do with him after that as he literally said it was all my fault for having grabbed the barrel and nothing would've happened if i had not grabbed the barrel in the first place.
 

DMTJAGER

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About 15 years ago I was sitting in a treestand in Kansas. I was strapped to the tree with my safety harness and had a full body decoy set out in front of me. I was probably 300 yards off of the road. A pickup stops along the road, sticks out his rifle (during archery season, rifle hunting not allowed) and starts shooting at the decoy that is 10 yards away from me under my treestand. I was strapped in the tree and couldn't go anywhere. Thankfully he realized it was a decoy and tore out of there. It could have been bad.

I've also been duck hunting and be hit by pellets from guys across the way. We could see the pellets falling across the water and we ducked. They had slowed down quite a bit and didn't cause any injury, but it's still the fact that someone is shooting in your direction.

This is senseless.
Same thing happened to me deer hunting over 30 years ago. Was up on top of a steep steep hill that I knew does bed on and unknown to me were evidently visible form the road. I was sitting in my DIY 18' ladder stand when I hear a car drive down the gravel road that borders the hill at a good clip, then hit the brakes and start to back up. Just as I start thinking this is not good I hear BOOM BOOM BOOM and hear slugs go wizzing by my head and can clearly hear them snapping limbs in the tree I'm sitting in. Then i see five does hauling butt up from the hill side past me.
Turned out to be the land owner next to me (I knew quite well) brother in law as he also saw him do it. I was pleasently surprised when the man assured me he will never be hunting on his land again as not to terribly far behind me and certainly within effective 12ga slug range, was his home in direct line with the direction his B-inlaw was shooting.
Not a experience I wish to ever again have I assure you.
 

Ucsdryder

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So who's fault is this?

Holy efff!!!!!!

“It’s better than being a homosexual.” You sure about that, mom? After he raped and pillaged a poor deer farm?!
 

fwafwow

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I hunt AZ and NM extensively. Both states dont have a hunter orange requirement. (Except NM has the requirement in a couple of units with military installations. I wish they did!

I always wear at least a red/orange cap and tie a red bandanna to the back of my backpack.

Red blacks out at distance. Hunter orange, chartreuse like they wear on highway workers and Flo Pink are all much better


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Ucsdryder

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Wtf good is charging this guys with a felony and sending him to jail is going to do? Cost the public money and turn a guy with a family into a felon? Not saying he didn’t majorly mess up but he identified the elk and shot it. Not excusing his actions but it wasn’t that far fetched if a reaction. I wonder why his buddy took off his orange and didn’t yell “I found it!!!!” I tend to believe the story as it sounds like there were a 3-4 people in the area so I can’t imagine the guy planned it all and staged it all.
 

brsnow

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Wtf good is charging this guys with a felony and sending him to jail is going to do? Cost the public money and turn a guy with a family into a felon? Not saying he didn’t majorly mess up but he identified the elk and shot it. Not excusing his actions but it wasn’t that far fetched if a reaction. I wonder why his buddy took off his orange and didn’t yell “I found it!!!!” I tend to believe the story as it sounds like there were a 3-4 people in the area so I can’t imagine the guy planned it all and staged it all.
If he hit what he was aiming at with a rifle, what do you call it?
 

Rob5589

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The story sounds kooky. Dude was kneeling by an elk that was trying to get up by he didn't finish it off? But the other guy that was a ways back did try to finish it off?
 

CoHiCntry

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The story sounds kooky. Dude was kneeling by an elk that was trying to get up by he didn't finish it off? But the other guy that was a ways back did try to finish it off?
I read it like the one guy was kneeling next to a dead elk and the other guy saw movement thinking the elk was getting up & he shot???
 
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