Washington (CNN) -- A crew member aboard a U.S. Navy ship accidentally fired a machine gun into the Polish port city of Gdynia on Wednesday while cleaning the weapon, Navy officials said Friday.
Three rounds were fired from an M240 machine gun into the town but no injuries or damage were reported, officials said.
Boy, I really hate it when I forget to unload my machine gun before cleaning it. And it's even worse when I fire it into a foreign town... Think someone's going to have about a decade of KP ahead of them?
The question, of course, is what really happened?
That is all.
10 comments:
When I was serving aboard the USS Cavalla (SSN-684) back in the early 90's some skimmer ship fired a few rounds off towards Waipahu. I don't know if they ever found out where exactly they came down, but I don't think this is an uncommon occurrence for the CIWS, if that's what this was.
OT: If you had to choose between an M1 Garand or an AR10 for a .30 cal rifle (for as many conceivable purposes as you care to name) and you alread have an AR15, which would you choose and why?
Performance Measures M240:
1. Checked to ensure the weapon is clear
2. Disassembled the M240
3. Cleaned the M240 parts components and ammunition
4. Inspected the M240 parts components and ammunition
5. Lubricated the M240 parts and components
Didn't make it past step one
I can't speak for this instance, but when the ex was back on the USS Boise (SSN-764) he pulled a fellow's fat out of the fire by proving the machine gun actually went off on its own--mind you, this was ages ago & I didn't understand the incident back then, so I can't give you a good run-down of it. I know that it happened more than once, and not just on the Boise.
Doesn't matter the size of your projectile slinger, the four rules still apply.
I'd hate to be even on the same watch section as that gun crew.
-All liberty is now secured.
-All hands stand by for MANDATORY safety training! (Even the cooks)
-Said duty section is now on alert status until further notice.
-ALL Cheifs meet in the Chiefs Mess IMMEDIATLY.
When I was overseas, I was a Brad gunner for a while. It was my job to take care of the coax (M240C-same thing, but designed for mounted use, as in no buttstock or grip) and the 25mm. Well headquarters platoon took my track out one day and nobody told me. I was out there looking things over later that day and noticed a link sticking out the feed tray of my coax. Not thinking about it, I checked the safety and popped the feed tray cover, and bam! Launched a round into FOB Diamondback or Mosul, depending how high the gun was elevated (I'm guessing Diamondback).
See, the bolt wasn't locked to the rear, just held in place by the feed tray, and when I opened the feed tray it fired. The safety should not have engaged without the bolt engaging the sear, so... that was a good way to find out the weapon was broken. Incandescent is the proper adjective to describe my anger at the 'gunner' who used my weapon and left it loaded. I was ready to beat the shit out of him for about a week, but I didn't need to lose rank over it.
If I was fully alert I would have noticed something was awry, but I had no clue someone else had touched my equipment, and it isn't really that obvious at a glance if the belt is all the way in the feed tray or not. From then on I held the bolt back manually with the charging cable, safe or not.
I also had some E6 come running up crying about how my round had gone right over his platoon's heads. He was threatening to take it to battalion and all that drama. Small problem: my turret was pointed ninety degrees to his platoon and two hundred yards away. Nice try, bud.
Nothing came of it.
Anyway, it's amazing how many people in the military, even 11Bs, don't know how to operate MGs. I was on retrans site north of Mosul once when a bunch of 88Ms blew up three M2HBs because they didn't do proper headspace and timing. Not like grenade boom, but 'oops I just blew the top cover in half' boom. Three. You'd think they would have figured it out after the first... or asked one of us infantry guys for help at least...
The problem is that for some reason people have it beat into thier heads a weapon should be placed on safe no matter what condition it is in. This doesn't work so well for the M240 because the safety can only be placed on when the bolt is locked to the rear. So Sailors (and I'm assuming others) make sure the weapon is clear, pull the bolt to rear just far enough to engage the safety, then allow the bolt to go forward again instead of locking it to the rear, because I was told by a 20 y/o BUSN the weapon is unsafe like that :|, then when they got to place the weapon in Cond 1 they just pull the bolt to the rear, 9 out of 10 times this will jam the bolt between the gun cover and the safety just far enough to the rear that if you open the cover or remove the safety the bolt goes forward stripping a round and firing it.
As an Armorer assigned to the 20th SRG I saw this exact thing happen 4-5 times. It's a matter of both bad design and poor training.
Rule #1: All guns are always loaded.
End of transmission.
tweaker
LC Scotty:
Let's just say that the PHALANX CIWS ain't the wonder weapon poeple think it is.
There's a reason people say the acronym stands for:
Captain, It Won't Shoot!
There's others that are the reason why I would NEVER trust one to NOT eat my arm, even if supposedly switched off for reloading.
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