here in san antonio on a military base we had a guy shooting at noises in the dark, this was a night hog hunt. he said it was a hog. just because someones in the military doesnt mean they know how to hunt or how to practice gun safety or even practice common sense.

In every Hunter Education class that I deliver, I always include a discussion on what defines being "sure of your target". While it may seem like a simple matter, hunters can fall into that trap that goes with having an overwhelming desire to kill a deer and end up using very poor judgement. As more experienced deer hunters know well, the mind can be fooled into making many images "appear" to be part of the head, body, or legs of a deer. Mix in the deep desire to kill a deer along with hunter fatigue and you have an accident waiting to happen. Obviously, no parent is going to purposely shoot their child. But when it does happen, it proves that the shooter must have actually believed they were shooting at a deer. But somewhere in that thought process a clear mistake had been made.

To start the discussion, I use a photo in which a tripod stand is almost hidden in the image. I ask everyone to see if they can find it. Most cannot, so I end up showing it to them. Then I ask them to find the deer in the photo. There has never been a class in which someone does not "take the bait" and admit they see a deer. Of course there is no deer in the photo. And from that point, the discussion begins. How do you know when you're sure of your target or that your mind is just fooling you.

For those HE instructors who might wish to include this same exercise and discussion in their own classes, I have included the photo below.

6:48 pm is when the incident happened!!! I don't know about y'all but where I hunt, that's way past LST.

Prayers for a speedy recover.

wow. Thank God the boy is still alive. That is tragic. The family is in our prayers.

X2, how was it not almost completely dark?

A $3 flashlight would have made this accident far less likely to have happened. Not so the dad could have better seen his son, but so that the dad could have very easily seen his son was not a deer.

I NEVER walk into or out of the woods in the early morning or at night without a flashlight. My fear of spooking deer is far less than the fear of not being able to take care of my wife and children.

6:48?!?!

Where I hunt anything past 6:20 is way too dark. I normally leave the stand around 6:15 cuz only things I can confirm are about 5 yards away.

Some people...

I witnessed a dad shooting his son once. We were dove hunting and there were a bunch of yahoos just across the fence on the other property. Son was retreiving dove for his dad. A bird flew between them when the son was on a retrieve. Dad shot the son in the thigh at 20 yards. It was not pretty. I was about 100 yards away and had a clear view of the whole thing. You could of heard the kid screaming from a half mile. Some people just should not be handling guns.

Prayers for all.

Once is an accident, 3 times is attempted murder.

Something about this doesnt make since to me. If I got shot i would start screaming. If I got shot again I would scream louder. How can you accidently shoot someone 3 times??? Also, if i was the kid I would be shooting back. Sorry old man.

It was 548 not 648 . The first mistake was 2 people rifle hunting on 10 acres!

^This^

Was he using an assault rifle to hunt deer? Could be one way he got three shots off.