Accidental shooting kills one on set of new Alec Baldwin movie

Police officers on movie sets?

How 'bout just a competent & responsible armorer, not some 24 year old kid who thinks it's cool to fire at cans with live rounds in your downtime?

Oh kneejerk overcorrections, you're so fun.
 
JubJub86 said:
Police officers on movie sets?

How 'bout just a competent & responsible armorer, not some 24 year old kid who thinks it's cool to fire at cans with live rounds in your downtime?

Oh kneejerk overcorrections, you're so fun.
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Given reports of how this is NOT behavior that's all that uncommon on sets I'm surprised this doesn't happen more often.
 
Except it's probably not and doesn't. There've been two that we know of in 28 years.

Obviously it happening again requires another look at protocols and a further doubling down of them, beefing up of consequences for those not following them. But you approach it rationally with perspective, not just throwing industry-wide bans on blank-firing props and demanding cops stand around doing nothing breathing down a competent weapons supervisor (as most of them are)'s shoulder.

Like again, you're not going to get something like this happening on some big Disney or WB or Universal movie. Maybe the indies have cowboys among them, and you need to root them out and banish them from the gigs. But even then, this hasn't happened stateside in a couple of decades, hysteria about some industry-wide lax attitude is probably unwarranted.
 
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I can't help but ask: what exactly would an on-set police officer even *do*? Properly trained police officers are trained in safe weapon-handling, yes. . . but that's safe handling of live weapons for live usage. Not handling of stage weapons and blank firing weapons and performance usage.
 
I would have thought an on-set armourer would be required to have a recognised Health & Safety qualification of some kind as well. Police Officers (in the UK, at least) don't routinely have those.
 
metaphysician said:
I can't help but ask: what exactly would an on-set police officer even *do*? Properly trained police officers are trained in safe weapon-handling, yes. . . but that's safe handling of live weapons for live usage. Not handling of stage weapons and blank firing weapons and performance usage.
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Blank firing guns are entirely real guns and can fire real ammunition. Blanks are real cartridges with real cordite that have packing and a cap instead of a lead bullet so they have to be fired in a real gun with firing pin and steel receiver.
 
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Yeah, that's the weird part about this I still don't get. A "prop gun" is a real gun, but it's been welded inside to shorten the mechanism so a live round physically can't fire from it but blanks can.

So, either this chick's lied about it being classified a "prop gun", or she's done a negligent ****ty job in modifying it. They had some guy on CNN doing a rundown on it, veteran movie armorer/safety guy who apparently handles most productions in Colorado. Guy did a full demonstration with a revolver, real weapon but went through how they're modified internally.

If that's the definition they use for "prop gun" in the industry, it couldn't fire a live round even if she was reckless & dumb enough to load one in there. Pretty certain it's going to come out during a trial or whatever that she handed Alec either a) a real factory-standard pistol or b) she didn't bother properly doing what she needed to do to nullify it, like she tried but wasn't qualified/competent enough to do it right.
 
JubJub86 said:
Yeah, that's the weird part about this I still don't get. A "prop gun" is a real gun, but it's been welded inside to shorten the mechanism so a live round physically can't fire from it but blanks can.
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My understanding: Though some movie firearms have been modified to accept only blank rounds, the use of real/working guns (which can fire either blanks or real bullets) is fairly common on sets.

In terms of "prop gun," it seems that term can apply to a rubber dummy or an actual, working gun... :shrug:
 
Marvolo said:
Blank firing guns are entirely real guns and can fire real ammunition. Blanks are real cartridges with real cordite that have packing and a cap instead of a lead bullet so they have to be fired in a real gun with firing pin and steel receiver.
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. . . yes? And there are proper procedures for how to handle weapons loaded with blanks for performance purposes, so that no one mistakes a blank-loaded weapon for an unloaded or a nonfunctioning prop weapon, that police officers. . . aren't trained in. Because police don't use blanks routinely, or performances in general.

( Also, my understanding is that not all weapons *can* fire blanks interchangeably with normal rounds, at least some need to be modified to operate properly. However, that's not actually relevant, since proper safety involves not making assumptions, and also a blank-loaded weapon is still dangerous. )
 
What about computering all weapon go forward. Spielberg do this in ET from gun to lights We already computer peoples in full real scale life so just do same for all gun and dagger and sword knives. The Rock Johnson say he will do all CGI or post produce weapon and no gun anymore
 
Yeah, Meta. And given they're supposed to check the weapons like three times, among more than one person, if that's followed to the letter it shouldn't be an issue.

This is a "they weren't doing their job" thing, not a "the rules aren't clear enough" thing.

Genuinely curious here too, Thangaran, not trying to be an ***hole. But is English your first language, or are we just making fun of you like jackasses?
 
Just as an aside, CBS Justice (ch 40) in the UK is at this very moment showing an old Perry Mason episode about "a clown accused of murder after his prop gun is replaced with the real thing"! I know it's been three weeks (to the day) since the death of Halyna Hutchins, but UK TV is normally pretty sensitive about this sort of thing. I'm surprised they're showing it.
 
Heh, yeah. People were pulling Simpsons episodes left right and center after 9/11, pretty funny some UK network would air that content so soon.
 
In a snippet from that interview he claims that he didn't pull the trigger on the gun so I'm curious to hear his full explanation on that.
 
FYI, the round that was shot and caused the death of Brandon Lee was not a live round. The gun on the set was loaded with a blank. However, the barrel of the gun being used contained a "lethal obstruction" which caused Lee's death.

Point being, even a "prop gun" with a blank can still cause an accidental death.
 
TheVileOne said:
FYI, the round that was shot and caused the death of Brandon Lee was not a live round. The gun on the set was loaded with a blank. However, the barrel of the gun being used contained a "lethal obstruction" which caused Lee's death.
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Well, sorta… But the “lethal obstruction” was a bullet.

The production called for a close-up scene of one of the villains handling his .44 Magnum gun and bullets. Normally, for such a scene, totally inert “dummy bullets” would used. However, the location (North Carolina) couldn’t easily find these fake bullets. So the prop guy (doubling as armorer) decided to make his own from live rounds (by emptying out the powder). But the projectile tip from one of these improvised bullets separated from its casing and got lodged in the barrel of the .44. Later, when a blank .44 round was fired, it propelled the intact tip with virtually the same deadly force as a real/live round.

So in a roundabout fashion, the tragedy on The Crow was due to the same violation of safety protocols that occurred on Rust. I.e., live rounds were brought onto both movie sets.
 
Dr. said:
Well, sorta… But the “lethal obstruction” was a bullet.

The production called for a close-up scene of one of the villains handling his .44 Magnum gun and bullets. Normally, for such a scene, totally inert “dummy bullets” would used. However, the location (North Carolina) couldn’t easily find these fake bullets. So the prop guy (doubling as armorer) decided to make his own from live rounds (by emptying out the powder). But the projectile tip from one of these improvised bullets separated from its casing and got lodged in the barrel of the .44. Later, when a blank .44 round was fired, it propelled the intact tip with virtually the same deadly force as a real/live round.

So in a roundabout fashion, the tragedy on The Crow was due to the same violation of safety protocols that occurred on Rust. I.e., live rounds were brought onto both movie sets.
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OK but it still wasn't loaded with a "live round" at the time. And there was still safety negligence at multiple levels.
 

What the hell is that "letter"? Jesus, where is his goddamned lawyer.

Just shut the **** up.
 
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