Officials in Tennessee say that a father and his 12-year-old son died over the weekend after an AR-15 assault-style rifle accidentally discharged, causing a fire and then a series of explosions in a room full of ammunition.
WBBJ-TV reported on Monday that Tennessee State Bomb and Arson Investigators, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation and Henderson County Sheriff’s Department were all looking into the Sunday deaths 48-year-old Terry York and his son, Luke.
According to family members, York’s AR-15 rifle accidentally discharged while he was in a back room of their home showing it off to some friends. The discharge ignited a small fire, which “did not seem too threatening at first,” they told WBBJ-TV. The blaze apparently grew out of control after Luke entered the room to help his father put out fire.
That’s when witnesses started hearing explosions.
“It was just like one right after another,” neighbor Kathleen Glass recalled. “One explosion right after another. I just don’t have the words for it because I can not imagine having to go through something like this.”
The family said that York stored a lot of ammunition in the room where the fire started, but officials insisted that they would conduct a full investigation before coming to any conclusions.
“Any loss of life is tragic, when a child looses their life it hit the community hard,” Henderson County Sheriff Brian Duke explained. “There was maybe an accidental discharge of the weapon from there we haven’t really determined how the fire started but that is what State Bomb and Arson officials are looking into.”
Investigators did say that York and his son were discovered just steps away from the exit, but may have been blinded by the smoke while trying to escape.
According to this story, I can see multiple failures to follow proper firearm safety practices, trigger control has obviously been ignored but the biggest one is in not treating every gun as if it were loaded.
Muzzle control is even more important than trigger control as a fail safe in my opinion. If that bullet would have gone through the roof then we probably would have never heard about it.
Playing with a loaded gun in a room full of ammunition ain't too bright in the first place.
The really sad part is the little guy.
If there were other adults present as the story says then someone should have grabbed that kid by the scruff of the neck and drug him the hell out of the house instead of letting him get anywhere near that room.
MULTIPLE FAIL.
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Posted by: Tukiyooo
Why Gun Safety Matters Updated at :
12:30 PM
Tuesday, August 20, 2013
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