Dangers of Complacency
Many years of familiarity with much of anything will cause a certain level of complacency to establish itself. When this happens most of the time it manifests itself in much the same way extensive training does; things are done automatically with an often dulled awareness to the task at hand. This may be desirable in training reflexes but if you’ve driven 10 miles and don’t remember stopping at the last 3 stop signs it is a danger sign that your mind is not at your task.
This applies no where more critically than firearms ownership as a Virginia delegate found out the hard way. It seems he fell into a routine in dealing with his personal firearm. It is quite fortunate for him that he ended up only embarrassed (and risks rule changes that prevent delegates from carrying firearms) rather than killing or wounding someone.
The delegate really made 3 mistakes here. First off, ones mind must always be on the firearm when handling one. Period. Secondly his routine itself was part of the problem. It seems from the article he would come into the office and unload the piece and store it. Then when leaving for the day he’d load it again. During this exercise he was not minding where his muzzle was pointed and the way he discusses “finger on the trigger” this guy knows the rules but chose to disregard or his attention was diverted elsewhere.
In fact he shouldn’t have been unloading/loading in the office at all. There are several companies that make fast access personal handgun safes for just this guy’s situation. Using such a safe and then leaving the pistol loaded (and preferably holstered) would have greatly reduced the potential for this type of accident. Every single time a weapon of any kind is loaded or unloaded there is a small percentage possibility of an accident. Personally I feel the danger of a pistol stored loaded, in it’s holster, is less than accrued danger of the daily load/unload/load/unload as he was likely doing exactly the same routine at home every morning and evening as well.
This is actually one reason I prefer my Safariland paddle holsters. The whole thing comes off the waist and straight into the safe without ever removing the piece from the holster.