Bang! Oops.
My aunt and uncle have a farm in County Durham. I used to spend a lot of time there as a teenager. My uncle taught me how to handle guns and kill things because that's what a growing sociopath needs. You haven't lived until you've competed at keepie-up with my uncle, a shotgun and a wood pigeon.

As it turns out I'm a pretty good marksman (which the air force later utilised in competitions).

So there I was sitting on the gate of the grain shed. A .22 on one side and a 12 bore on the other. The .22 was for knocking off the rats that periodically raided the grain store and would be seen surfacing and running along the back wall. The 12 bore was for the pigeons and shit that depleted the crops.

A little sparrow landed in the yard and began pecking around. Nothing else was in sight to shoot so I thought I'd give it a shock. I picked up the rifle and aimed a few inches in front of it.I wasn't really paying attention and not really aiming properly or holding the gun properly.

As I squeezed the trigger urgent messages began to come from the back of my brain a little too late that I wasn't looking along a pin and v sight on a single barrel.

*Boom*. The sparrow became a cloud of feathers and gore. I hadn't braced or balanced for the kickback so I flew back off the gate and had a soft landing on a couple of bales of straw.

The broken collar bone took 6 weeks to heal.
(Warwick, Tue 29 May 2012, 22:59, 10 replies)

The professionals do that too.
voices.yahoo.com/judge-rules-officer-johannes-mehserle-7136696.html
(speedevil, Wed 30 May 2012, 1:11, closed)

I'd not read about that :)
(Warwick, Wed 30 May 2012, 7:57, closed)

"Boom" with a .22?
They have as much kick as a flaccid octopus.
( Ken Oath, Wed 30 May 2012, 10:46, closed)

I think he meant the shotgun.
.22 goes more like "ping"
(Misery McUglywife an attention seeking sociopathic fuckstain., Wed 30 May 2012, 11:21, closed)

I think the idea is he thought he had the 22 but really it was the shotgun (hence the reference to the sights, as shotguns usually just have a rail).
(tyrellsOwl, Wed 30 May 2012, 12:37, closed)

Well he should really get his guns right..
..shotguns aren't rifled, they are smooth bore. Gun pedant.
( Ken Oath, Wed 30 May 2012, 13:56, closed)

They can be rifled but it is rare. Sometimes they are modified to shoot sabot rounds down a rifled barrel.
/very pedantic
(tyrellsOwl, Wed 30 May 2012, 16:58, closed)

Yep. I picked the wrong gun off the hook. The .22 wouldn't have broken my collar bone or even hurt me.
(Warwick, Thu 31 May 2012, 4:09, closed)

A cloud of feathers and gore, and all that was wrong was a broken collar bone?
I always said that sparrows were attention-seeking little shits.
( drimble he'd been white, he'd been black, Wed 30 May 2012, 10:53, closed)

haha
You think a 12 bore kicks?
Try a .300 Win Mag, holy crap- you need a good recoil pad and an elastic shoulder. I tried one out last year, my right ear stopped ringing after 2 days, the shoulder felt twitchy for a week.
These things will drop a moose at 1000 yards mind..
( Infidel , shit and wrong, Wed 30 May 2012, 16:10, closed)