My son just got back from an elk hunt in Colorado. Didn't get an elk but he almost lost his life due to an extremely careless or possibly stupid hunter. My boy was takeing a break from hunting and was eating a bite when he noticed movement on another ridge about 500 yards away.
He looks over that way with his binos and sees a hunter laying prone, using a pack for a rifle rest and he is pointing his rifle right at my son. At first my son is thinking that he must be seeing things wrong. He takes another look and sure enough, this other guy is aiming right at him. This makes him extremely nervous so he grabs his pack and decides to vacate the area and get out of sight. As he gets up a shot is fired and the round hits three feet below my son. He then skeedadles over the ridge he's on and drops down into a depression. After hiding for a bit he peeks over the ridge and sees the jerk with the rifle walking calmly away and a tan pickup arrives and picks the idiot up and off they drive.
My son was wearing his hunter orange vest. In fact it almost never comes off, even in camp.
Later in the day my boy comes across that same pickup and goes up to the truck to talk to the occupants. It's a group of hunters from California and in the back seat is an old man that my boy estimates to be around 80 years old, wearing very thick glasses. He let's the driver know that he was shot at by someone in that group and that they might want to be more careful in the future. The driver gets defensive and denys that anything like that could have happened. When my boy pushes the issue the guy accuses my son of not wearing his orange vest which he has on at that very moment. He hasn't taken off all day. Well my boy keeps his cool and just lets them know that they almost took a life that day and to please be careful and learn from this experience. The driver finally says that IF one of them did it then he apologized for the group. The old man kept quiet the whole time and wouldn't hardly look towards my son. Hmm.
I thank God that he took care of my son that day.
I don't think that the shooting was intentional. I think that the old man was the shooter and that he was using his scope as a binocular to see some distant movement (my son) and probably had his finger on the trigger and didn't even realize it. At least I hope that it was a foolish accident and not intentional.
Guys, never, never, NEVER, use your rifle scope to scout with.
Thanks for letting me blow off some steam here guys. I'm just so mad at what could have been. Some people should not be allowed to hunt without supervision.
Once again I'd like to thank the lord for his grace and blessings on our family.
Ok rant over.
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