Accidental shooting Delamere

[1lessdog]

Saturday night two hunters were out hunting Coyote with thermals. They shot what they thought was a Coyote on a slough. They never went to check on it. But instead went to a bar and talked about it. That when the law was called. They shot a young man from a Hutterite Colony who was checking his Muskrat traps and is now paralyzed from the neck down.

I was told thermals. But with full moon could have been hunting in the moon light.

Anyone else hear anything

Richland sheriff said its being investigated

 

[Kurtr]

I just got my thermal yesterday and playing with it last night i could tell the difference from a cow and horse from 416 yards. I dont how you mistake a human for a coyote unless you are long ways away and at that point should not be shooting in my mind. If its true thats an accident that is completely avoidable.

 

[Petras]

holy shit... wonder if they went from the bar to hunting coyotes and then back to the bar... how you mistake a person walking on 2 for a coyote that walks on all 4s is beyond me...

 

[Jiffy]

I’m not a fan of high powered rifles at night.

There I said it.

 

[Traxion]

The thermal stuff is crazy right now. With a good thermal the clarity is amazing. With cheaper stuff not so much and that is where I get nervous. Dog deer who knows what it is. Sound decisions must be made no matter what. I’m not comfortable with long range stuff at night even with good optics. Never know if you’re shooting at a coyote or Lassie.

One trigger pull and lives change forever. Very sad.

 

[Obi-Wan]

Saturday night two hunters were out hunting Coyote with thermals. They shot what they thought was a Coyote on a slough. They never went to check on it. But instead went to a bar and talked about it. That when the law was called. They shot a young man from a Hutterite Colony who was checking his Muskrat traps and is now paralyzed from the neck down.

I was told thermals. But with full moon could have been hunting in the moon light.

Anyone else hear anything

Richland sheriff said its being investigated

not finding any news reports on this ?

 

[Silver]

My first thought is this is not good.....
Second thought....never went to check if they hit the target?
Third thought....why is the young man checking his muskrat traps at night?

 

[Griz]

My first thought is this is not good.....
Second thought....never went to check if they hit the target?
Third thought....why is the young man checking his muskrat traps at night?

I used to trap muskrats back in the late 70’s and early 80’s . I often had to make a final round in the dark. It gets dark early this time of year. You’re wondering why he was checking ? He was doing it right to make sure he was doing the ethical thing .

 

[1lessdog]

My first thought is this is not good.....
Second thought....never went to check if they hit the target?
Third thought....why is the young man checking his muskrat traps at night?

Why wouldn't he check his traps at night. He wasn't doing nothing wrong. Don't make the Trapper look like the bad guy.


I would check my Muskrat traps all day and night till it dried up. I always figured 5 rats pure hut. If 20 huts, then 100 rats when I got to about 90% of the total I was expecting I would start pulling traps. Walking around on the ice chased them back into the huts.

 

[NDbowman]

 

[Allen]

I was really hoping this was some sort of joke.

Apparently not...

 

[Skeeter]

Hang these two fuckers. Always know your target. There is a reason you shouldn’t hunt at night.

 

[Obi-Wan]

My first thought is this is not good.....
Second thought....never went to check if they hit the target?
Third thought....why is the young man checking his muskrat traps at night?

we used to check our musket traps before school, in the dark and then after school typically got home around 7 to 8 o’clock at night, agin in the dark

 

[Eatsleeptrap]

Sadly, it was turned over to game and fish. I say sadly because years ago when a local drunk shot at "geese" out in a field with a high power rifle, and shot a guy laying in DECOYS in the arm, it was turned over to game and fish, and nothing happened to him.

 

[SLE]

Anyone that's looked through a thermal at night can see a discerning difference between a person and a coyote. Hell, you can tell the difference between a coyote and a badger or a racoon for f' sakes. This has other issues written all over it. The hunter (and I use that word lightly in this case) obviously didn't identify his target (or did ) and didn't go up to check his kill or animal after the shot. I would have to expect there was movement after the shot which you can also clearly see in a thermal and should be able to tell if it was an animal or human. He may have seen a heat blob in the scope and taken a long distance shot and got lucky, but thermals aren't exactly long range optics in terms of accuracy to start with. 500 yards would be a poke for accuracy purposes with one. The one thing I took away after spending some time behind a thermal was that it was very hard to tell whether the target was 250 yds or 1000 yds away without the internal range finder. With that said, it was clear what are targets were at both distances.

What I don't want to happen is this one off situation of some poor choices to affect using thermals for coyotes or limitations on trapping times. This wasn't a case where either of those are the problem.

 

[SDMF]

I’m not a fan of high powered rifles at night.

There I said it.

Hang these two fuckers. Always know your target. There is a reason you shouldn’t hunt at night.

Understood, and I respect your opinions.

I was out during the day and night on a couple of those foggy/misty days last week. I could discern more detail, at a longer distance w/the thermal gear than I could w/good binos and/or my regular daytime rifle scope during the peak daylight hours. I could also see more detail at a longer distance w/the thermal gear than I could @ night w/my pickup headlights even though they're fresh housings/lenses and bulbs.

 

[Kurtr]

From the sounds of it some booze was involved and there is no way you mistake a person for a coyote will be interesting to see if there is more to the story. You can’t blame any one or anything other than the guy who pulled the trigger.

 

[scrotcaster]

This makes me incredible sad.. Prayers to the young man

 

[Jiffy]

I’m not a fan of firearms at night period! I don’t care if you think you can see or not. People, in general, are idiots bad enough during the day!

Do I want to ban hunting at night with thermals? Absolutely not! Just because I don’t agree with it doesn’t mean it should be banned. I just have close to zero interest in thermals. I should perhaps buy one though, just because.

 

[KDM]

Heart breaking news. Three men's lives forever changed. My thoughts and prayers to all involved. I also think that this could have been me in past activities. When I ran a trap line, most times I had run my trap line after dark because I went to work in the dark and get off work in the dark. I would move and make new sets on weekends. Scary to think about.