Gunny2862

For something new - I thought this was going to be completely one-sided when I first saw it, this actually appears to be pretty balanced relatively objective coverage. Still stick to proper gun handling.

http://rockcenter.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/04/11/11148671-owners-of-some-remington-shotguns-rifles-claim-pattern-of-inadvertent-discharges

The Technical answer is here: http://www.gunsmiths.com/articledetail.php?id=87

The practical answer is still following basic gun safety precautions, with for this trigger system in particular the possible addition of ensuring the weapon is pointed in a safe direction not only at all times but especially when disengaging the safety.

I think in theory, in Theory, that if there was buy in that it could be done in six months, and the second election could solidify issues. But everyone involved FROM THE BOTTOM TO THE TOP - IH, COR, CC, Committee, SM, ASM's, SPL, PL's and Scouts would all have to actually agree that it should and could be done.

I think that in reality, unless you are starting from scratch, that you have a group or groups of folks to win over and believe you really mean boy-led and not adult led with a different look. The more groups or the more entrenched any one group is... The longer it's going to take.

Okay, those who have read my old posts know that the SM before me was a great guy. But he IMHO, was a great guy and a great Guide (Tour Operator).

We moved out of adult led and into youth led as quickly as I could make it happen, fortunately the fellow before was a big supporter of "Outing is Scouting" so we had plenty of opportunity to make those changes on outings.

I also took to heart the saying "I don't know why don't you ask the SPL?" While trying to know in advance what he was going to say or at least what his options really were.

The third key for me has been trying to ensure that the PLC gets their training after every election cycle and EXPECTING that they do their jobs.

Part of doing their jobs is that a Troop meeting ought to be able to be run without an Adult in the room, doesn't mean not be there, but they ought to be able to do a normal regular weekly meeting without any input from the adults.

I was talking to a former fellow Scoutmaster today, he resigned(he's still working with the Troop but is more involved with the Council for now) just as he was getting close to his goal of changing his Troop over - It took him five years to get the ball close to the goal line as he saw it.

Point is not to try and flip the Troop in a month. It's a process, make small goals, enjoy achieving them, get the committee especially the CC on board, let them see the positive changes via the small wins, garner the parent support by building character into the boys as opposed to just teaching them some skills or amassing certifications that they were exposed to what is really a relatively small amount of knowledge(Merit Badges).

It's not about clicking boxes, but about using those box clicks as character building opportunities - do it that way ans both you and the boys and then maybe the parents will see the big wins in doing it the right way.

Eamonn, sorry your son found out the hard way.

Every weapon I have ever seen, I have treated as loaded until I cleared it, every time.

One of my High School Classmates, a really great guy, was already accepted into the military with a guaranteed law enforcement contract, a Police Cadet and at certain times under supervision was allowed to carry in uniform.

He was showing someone his sidearm having cleared it at his home and for some reason left the room, The individual in the room(not me) loaded and played with the weapon and like your son wasn't educated enough on the devices to understand that dropping the magazine doesn't clear the chamber. My classmate walked back into the room and found the weapon as he supposed he left it and did something dumb - it was the last thing he ever did. I have never forgotten the story. It, along with a lot of training, has been a cornerstone of Firearms safety in my life.

Education and an AWARENESS of what the devices are and what they do needs to be cultivated in those who have them in their lives.

I spent the day getting retrained on Range operations for BB Guns for Cub Scouts, and then went and assisted the RO for the Rifle Shooting MB. I helped with one shooter in particular and while he wound up not qualifying before I left(he couldn't get 5 consistent shots, was shooting 4 under a dime at the end but always threw one) but he had been starting with about 3 inch groups and shrank them nicely - I tell you about this shooter not because I helped him shrink his groups but because of the more important lesson... he had been consistently reloading with a finger on the trigger when I walked up - by the time I left he understood and had patterned indexing his finger nicely for three strings of fire after a few previous ones where he had had a slip or two.

I really enjoy helping them improve their marksmanship skills, but to me the important part of the Shooting Sports portion from Cub Scouts all the way up in Scouting is beginning as early as you can get them and imprinting a safety consciousness about firearms.

As most events Scout will encounter firearms at are Range situations, then even if these firearms were used then basic Range precautions IF FOLLOWED should keep there from being any incidents with injury.

The incidents I'm aware of with the rifles, and with this issue I'm sure there are those I'm not, even when hunting the basic precautions should suffice IF FOLLOWED. Silly seeming things like unloading before crossing a fence, actually keeping the safety on until ready to fire, making it a practice to NEVER have your finger inside the guard until ready to fire, etc. go a long way towards preventing inadvertent discharges.

Also having a Limited Technical Inspection by a Competent Gunsmith wouldn't be out of line for any of these that you encounter, especially if you are going to put them into the hands of Scouts or other youth. When asking them to do the LTI voice your concern over this issue and ask about anything they may know about that could be done to lessen the likelihood of a mechanically caused inadvertent discharge on your particular firearm.

drmbear,

I haven't tried it myself yet, but my understanding is that the problem you mention is a result of a traditional hammock.

Most of the ones people here are talking about are diagonal or offset sleeping systems where you wind up sleeping much flatter and not so much like a banana.

Happy Happy Birthday!

Santa Claus has lost his way, No more presents on Christmas day, but Happy Birthday, Hey!, Happy Birthday, Hey!

Easter Bunny broke his leg, No Candy Gifts on Easter day, but Happy Birthday, Hey!,Happy Birthday, Hey!

Chainsaws running, trees are Falling, Oh No! Global warming! but Happy Birthday, Hey!,Happy Birthday, Hey!

Happy Birthday Terry!

If you do have to take a hammock to ground, all you really need is two trekking poles and some extra cordage (550 cord, etc.) Easy to make a tent out of it if necessary.

I've had a couple that were "interesting" but not necessarily "bad".

The brand new tent that not only wasn't seam sealed but wound up not having any waterproofing applied... you can use your own imagination to figure out how I found that out

The first time in the rain in a real Canvas pup tent(shelter half buttoned to the other recruits shelter half) um, they aren't that big and the rain comes right through when/if you touch the side, a fact that was very interesting to my buddy until the ramifications of his experiments (he actually saw what was happening and still kept drawing on the side) finally "soaked" in - yes, I'm "that" old.

The wife decided she wanted to camp next to the lake during storm season. NO hard shelters for several miles... Tornado within 1/2 -1/4 mile, kid was probably 3 - at least He slept thru it... At least I had been able to choose a "somewhat" protected site. We lucked out on that one...

I can definitely relate to Beavah's Bivy story - that was scary as, well, something really scary - adding to it, nearly hypothermic in addition as I had in a fit of kindness given my sleeping bag to a first night as a Reservist who had shown up after Supply had closed and had been sent to the field without even a complete cold weather jacket and no parts of a sleep system...(sometimes doing the right thing is dumb - still right, but dumb...) and it wasn't the tents fault...

It showed up on my Facebook today, glad you liked it. It seemed like a good addition to the thread...

Stosh, I think I'll agree in principle with where you are going here.

But I don't really think it's possible to develop the relationship with every SPL that I have with my son. Should it be more like that?, I can easily see how it could be argued that it should. But I'm not sure given what time I've invested in my son "over a long period of time" how I could or could even expect to get that kind of time invested in each Scout.

I have to admit, I probably expected more from my son than I have with the others, but I got more too. It's possible that what I need to do is expect more form the others also. I am unaware of any charges/thoughts of favoritism toward my son but I do know that he also used me more as a sounding board than any of the others have - of course he had real 24 hour access(of course had he tried to use any of it between 11pm and 6 am he would have gotten the same answer any of the others would - call me in the morning).

No matter what claims I make of being available, my son believed he had the access.

The Neo air seems like it would be by far the lightest. Here in MO, AR, KS I inevitably find stuff in the morning I didn't find the night before during set-up. We almost inevitably wind up arriving after dark on Friday. I have had no punctures with my earlier Thermarest or with the Exped but the material on the Neo air seems like it would possibly run into durability issues from the odd stick or vine poking from under the tent.

Check out the Hennessey Hammocks http://hennessyhammock.com/ I'm thinking about the Explorer Deluxe Asym Classic, I've priced out some other hammocks and tarps and bug net combo's. While it can be done cheaper especially with pieces and parts rather than buying a system from any maker, the thing about the Hennessey is that supposedly you can sleep "diagonally" or offset and thus the tension is taken up in such a way that you can still sleep flat. I haven't tried Hammock sleeping yet - I'd be interested in why's from folks who have tried it and both why those who have liked it liked it and why those who didn't , didn't.

desertrat77, glad I was good for a chuckle. Man I still don't know what the change was, I could literally sleep anytime, anywhere, laying down, strapped in up right, sitting - didn't matter and almost overnight, bam, decent sleeping conditions or no sleep.

I can't explain it and I'm hardly a geezer but I my case I could sleep on a ships steel deck plate (and have), in foxholes (and have) and never really had any issues, then almost like flipping a switch right at about 38 (more than several years ago) nothing was working - no major injuries that weren't five or more years old, just a distinct inability to sleep without some kind of padding.

Go here https://myscouting.scouting.org register with your BSA member number or login as a guest and then go to the online training resources, you'll find it there. They attempted to create a fun interactive training experience, no one told the Instructional designer it was intended for adults. Thus the talk about the morphing blob. Also if one's connection to the site experiences interrupted traffic it occasionally makes you quit and repeat the course rather than reload and continue. I've been pretty lucky but not everyone has. And there's the background.

I love my Exped SynMat 7.

I had been using the Mil issue thermal pad and graduated to a 1inch 3/4 length Thermarest with my feet on my pack. At some point there just wasn't enough comfort there to allow decent sleep and I bought the SynMat. It is amazing, I compare it to my Sleep Number bed. If I'm not sleeping it isn't because of the pad.

True, whether the Scout is a swimmer or not applies no pressure to me as a Scoutmaster.

If the Scout needs additional work then, I may be available or the parents may need to enroll him in a swim class or they may just need to spend some quality time at the pool with him.

All Scoutmasters are supposed to do is provide opportunity, not eliminate naturally occurring obstacles - those are what the boys are supposed to encounter and deal with, building character along the way.

Now I might give a little guidance or help someone along with advice or some extra encouragement, but not by removing or lowering the standard.

Thus no extra stress on the Scoutmaster.

It's bad when the youth for whatever reason fail to complete something.

It's terrible when the "Adults" fail the youth by simply not following through.

It was pretty odd, but I have a successful pass on the course(twice).

perdidochas - Ditto, although a back float is fine too. Where they get resting backstroke from though... Maybe with a BC and some fins...

And one to de-bunk the non-coverage issue as you have to intentionally want to harm the lightbulb for the coverage not to apply.

We do outside of Camp Swim tests. Especially if we are going to Canoe or Swim and they haven't been classified at Camp yet.

Having been a Life Guard Instructor, Life guard, Scuba Diver(Advanced Open, Open, Deep, and Rescue certs) and spouse of a WSSI, if you pass me you are good to go at camp.

However even so, if you go to camp where we have gone every single person who arrives and is staying the week, takes a swim test, Adult and Youth Staff, Commissioners, all Campers and Camping Adults. (Okay, possible exception, I don't think they made the paid cooks take the test unless they went to the pool).(This message has been edited by Gunny2862)

Engineer 61, if your observations were accurate (and I have no reason to believe they weren't) then sorry your YMCA lifeguard didn't understand the value of a standard or of upholding it.

At the summer camp our troop attends he'd certainly not be a blue swimmer(swimmer), probably wouldn't make it into the intermediate area, and would most likely be offered the beginning swimmer class instead of one of his pre-selected MB's unless he had a free time slot to use instead.