What's your worst mid-hunt equipment failure?

[Dos Perros]

Killed my first bull this September. Shuttling meat down to the trail I had way too much and I ripped one of the waist pads off my pack's belt. Then, the sole of my boot nearly completely detached and I had to duct tape it back on (but that only lasted a couple miles). So that was pretty fun.

 

[Bigwindymt]

I have that same gun and that same thing happened to me last year pheasant hunting

H
Same story here, twice in the 20 years I have had the gun. Have you guys had your 11-87 flip out it's extractor yet? Mine became a single shot the first time it happened. The second and third time I spotted it in the grass and popped it back in to finish the hunt. Hasn't done it again since I started carrying a spare in my vest.

 

[Rich M]

Remington 700 SPS 7MM Rem Mag. Shot from 250 yards and the trigger was solid. Horror. Tried again, solid. Said screw it and put the safety back on, BANG! Wasn't even on Target.
Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk

I had a similar experience with a Remington 700 - hunting in a blizzard, came up on some deer and tried to shoot but had a soft firing pin hit and had to work the bolt to reset the firing pin - gun went off second time.

Then my uncle had a Model 700 freeze up on him too.

Mine was the outside portion of the pin/slide thing freezing and my uncle's was internal like described above.

I switched to a Win Mod 70 back around 1980 due to that. Don't remember what old uncle did. Where we hunted if you had a shot per season, it was a good season. Just keep removing the variables and upping the odds...

 

[ghostmoney]

I saw a buck and shouldered my rifle only to find my Leupold VX-III completely fogged up. Have now switched to nightforce.

 

[Danomite]

The read out on my rangefinder stopped working on the first day of a muzzleloader elk hunt last year. I overcame the problem by staying completely out of muzzleloader range of any bulls I saw for the duration of the hunt.

 

[WCS]

So what rain gear do you use now?

I've used Sitka Stormfront now the last couple of seasons.

 

[Jebuwh]

More operator error and bad luck that equipment failure...
Second day of a rifle hunt, driving up a snowy logging road, my buddy grabs his jacket off the dash and a few loose rounds fall out of his pocket. One lands straight in hole for his missing cigarette lighter ( apparently the ash tray had rattled open on the rough road).
It felt like a slow motion scene from a movie. I exited the truck at 20 mph, my buddy who was driving got his head out the door just as the shell went off. Blew chunks of the dash apart all around the ash tray, cracked the windshield, and the rear window, pieces of dash and shell casing embedded all over the truck and my buddy. Fortunately we were both wearing heavy clothes so he didn’t have any deep cuts and I had some cushion for my landing when I bailed out.
We spent half the day patching the wires in the dash to make it back home.

That is freakin wild! I can't see there being many other people who could say they had that same experiece. Imagine if it was a .50BMG or something.

 

[Britt-dog]

Bow tech BTX28, string derailed as I drew on what would have been my biggest antelope. It was a spot and stalk hunt and I had belly crawled a loooong ways to be in position. Still not sure what happened but there may have been some grass or a stick that caused it. Had it restrung and it has been fine ever since. I keep it as a back up bow but had trouble trusting it after.

 

[glass eye]

Choppered up into the NZ alps despite being warned of a major storm system coming soon. The weather at sea level was recorded as 10" of rain driven by 100kph sustained winds with 120k gust for 40 hours straight, then it snowed. I imagine it was worse than that at the top of the alps. Woke up during the night to a flooded tent, it was like a bathtub. It was pouring in faster than we could bail it so I stabbed holes in the floor of my tent in the low spots. The wind snapped the vestibule pole. Had to call on mountain radio for extraction which ended our hunt before we even started.

 

[huntaholic123]

My knee. Awaiting MRI results. Talk about a show stopper.

 

[AZ_Hunter_2000]

There's one ranch in Mexico that put a curse on one of my rifles; my dedicated Coues rifle. This past January I went to take a shot a true B&C buck. Ranged him, dialed the distance, and took the shot. The shot was way low.

The zero stop lock ring came loose on my scope and I had no way to repair it. Borrowed a rifle and shot a nice Coues. However, the one I missed still haunts me to this day. Hopefully he is still alive so that I can get redemption this coming January.

 

[glass eye]

My knee. Awaiting MRI results. Talk about a show stopper.

That reminds me. Day 2 on one of my tahr hunts I tore the menuscus in my good knee. For the rest of the trip I was hobbling along and not able to walk far at all. Managed to get a nice buck chamois when he walked into my zone.

 

[Doc Holliday]

Leki Micro Vario Carbon Trekking pole.....how I dealt with it is I only had 1 pole for the rest of the hunt....it sucked. Next time I will have some Black Diamonds

 

[TREE ‘EM]

My buddy Greg asked me what I was cooking in my pack. Puzzled by his question, I decided to have a look for myself. Found my diamond headlamp with the external battery pack shorted out and and smoldering away with my tent, sleeping bag and jacket. I solved the problem by throwing it in the beaver pond and shivering until the next morning when I had enough light to walk out.

Had a sole come off a boot about 12 miles from the truck while leading dogs back from a bear tree. Cut off my shirt sleeves at the shoulders and cut the wrist slot a little further up so I could button the cuff behind my ankle with them over the boots and soles to keep them together and keep debris out. Then I cut strips from the bottom of my shirt to hold it all together.
That was the 80’s when $50 for a pair of boots seemed insane but $5000 for a dog seemed reasonable... I’ve since adjusted my budget to allow for inflation on dogs

 

[Wellsdw]

I aired out the rental car on a speed hump 450 miles from the agency where we rented from about 7 hours into the trip. (I thought I was on the next street over). We were in the town nearest to our destination. Turns out Kia radiators are hard to come by in Wyoming, just FYI. Had it been the 4Runner we reserved we would have made it. Ended up renting a 17’ uhaul to drive. That was the only thing to rent. Got the rental car back 9 hours before our flight left.

 

[Walking Birds]

So far just a Tasco Silver Antler 3-9x40, it fogged up on my one November morning, but only the top 1/2 as fogged. I had a small buck walk in front of me in a hay lot that gave me some high contrast. I was able to take the shot, that scope came off that evening, wound up borrowing my dads spare rifle the rest of the season

 

[Turkeygetpwnd38]

Garmin InReach decides to not send messages. Updated and tested a week or two before Hunt. Unit would say messages had sent but was getting no responses. Packed 6 miles into flattops (south side access, not an easy pack in) carrying camp for 5-6 days, had told my wife I would check in every day, also the day after pack in my sister in law was scheduled to deliver a baby, a relatively high risk pregnancy, so it was a whole shit storm of bad timing. End up having to pack out so wife wouldn’t call search and rescue and to make sure everyone was ok. Contacted Garmin and was told that I had cancelled my service (impossible, wasn’t around a computer) but they would graciously reactivate without a fee. Not the first, second or third time my inReach has failed.

 

[KSP277]

Had a drop away rest convert itself to a launch pad while taking a shot at 140 class Whitetail. Arrow went into outer space some where. Buck ran off. Unbolted it and chucked it Out of my tree right there on the spot. Still there far as I know. Now shoot a QAD.

 

[MMK]

Driving ATV down an old logging road with one hand and holding my bow in my lap with the other. Not paying attention and hit a water bar, ripped the handle bars out of my hand. Rolled the ATV and it landed on my bow braking one of its limbs. I used my brothers bow the rest of the season.

 

[Spiral Horn]

About 20 years ago I was out in late shotgun season (mid-December, 2nd rut) and was using my old Marlin 512 Slug Gun. It was super cold ~0 degrees and I had the biggest Whitetail I’d ever seen before or since, a true monster, walking right down the secondary trail I was hunting. When he was 35 yards and still coming I flipped off the safety, put the crosshairs right on his vitals and attempted the shot. But the trigger was frozen and wouldn’t break.

I cycled the safety multiple times and it still wouldn’t go off - even opened and reclosed the bolt and it still wouldn’t fire. The buck heard my scrambling and stopped but didn’t see me in the tree. He was standing broadside at 25 yards and I again settled the crosshairs on his vitals and the squeezed as hard as I could. My sight picture was moving all over the place as I pulled with all my might. The gun finally went off but the shot went right underneath him. Unbelievably the buck just stood there wondering what happened. But now I couldn’t get the bolt open and had to watch him take a slow, relaxed walk out of my life. All I had left were tears and harsh language. It took me years and taking a few trophy bucks to begin to emotionally recover. But I’ve never shotgun hunted for deer since then.