Freakish ND in Florida Cracker Barrel

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Bartholomew Roberts

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An elderly man and his fiancee were dining at a Florida Cracker Barrel when the man's two-shot Cobra 9mm derringer slipped out of its holster and fell into the fireplace. The man didn't notice the missing gun/empty holster until the gun discharged in the fireplace - causing minor injury to his fiancee, the restaurant manager and another patron.

As safety issues go, this one is a bit bizarre but I thought it was a good reminder of the importance of a quality holster that fits the gun properly.
 
Report sounds like a bunch of "hooie" to me.

Set off your 9mm out of a 2.75" barrel inside a store/restaurant and nobody notices anything until you see the blood on your girlfriend's leg?

Three other people were hit and in one of them "removing the bullet fragment was a bit problematic."? But no one noticed a gunshot?

Maybe in Hollywood.
 
Reading that article was like listening to my 10 year old son try to explain where he misplaced the garbage can when he took it out to the curb...

It just doesn't make any sense at all.

Even if you have never been in a Cracker Barrel how did the gun magically get "inside" the fire/fire place? Dropped discharged and then "recoiled" into the fireplace? And no body heard a thing.
 
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it's been a good while since I've been in a cracker barrel, but when I traveled for work I frequented multiple dozens of them. I am trying to picture the standard layout, walk out of the gift-shop into the dining area, checker tables on your left and a large fireplace(either on the right wall blocking the kitchen or after the first dining entrance in the "middle" with seating on both sides). the fireplace is stone and freaking HUGE with a semi-folding glass divider. you can sit on the fireplace, but your still at least three feet from the fire and still have a divider.

maybe my mind is 100% wrong, but this is how I remember the place.

regardless, this story is lacking so many details and has a ton of question that go un-answered. but hey, it's the patch and I doubt these kids are pulling six-figures to write this crap. you gotta start somewhere.
 
Frequent Cracker Barrels a lot. They are all built to the same pattern. To get to the fireplace you have to step UP on the hearth. The actual "fire" (gas augmented) is about 18 inches into the fire box. This story "smells" as bad as month old eggs.
 
The gun was the only freshly cooked item that day.

Never liked Cracker Barrel. It's a crowded place with frozen entre‘s served on a dinner plate
 
When a gun fires because of heat, whether from firing or an outside source, the bullet acts just as it does any other time the gun fires. The powder/primer goes off and the bullet has the same MV and ME as it would have any other time. In fact the article says nothing about the gun being in the fire or being lost in the fireplace.

It sound more like the gun fired from being dropped on the hammer and the bullet hit the brick fireplace surround and broke up, with fragments hitting the people.

It needs to be noted that few of those derringers have the kind of hammer blocks or transfer bars that keep quality handguns from firing if dropped on the hammer or from firing if a cocked hammer is jarred off by a fall.

Jim
 
James- read it again. It DOES say the gun was found in the fireplace.
Cobra derringers have a hammer block, but it has to be manually applied.
 
after reading again, it sounds like the gun "ended up" in the fireplace after the ND. it sounds almost like the ND happened and the guy tried to figure out a quick way to ditch the evidence......but the story is so jumbled, we have no idea what really happened.
 
Seems to me I recall testing that concluded ammo won't fire in a fire. Just melts.

Three people hit by one totally random shot? Whole story strikes me a balony.
 
Seems to me I recall testing that concluded ammo won't fire in a fire. Just melts
Click to expand...

Ohh No... Ammo thrown into a fire MOST definitely goes bang. Loose rounds just tossed into a fire will "cook off" resulting in the case rupturing and a firecracker like POP.

If that round was contained in the chamber of a pistol, it would fire as normal and the bullet would have all the same energy as if fired by the normal means
 
Once a year i would have the fire dept burn the weeds on the berm at the police range. They would send the lowest seniority guys on foot with hoses to keep things under control and then the " seniors" would laugh at the complaints as the rounds that had been thrown there throughout the year cooked off. There was no real danger with their padded clothing, the brass would fly farther than the heavier bullet. Most of the discards were duds from remanufactured .38 spec that was used for academy training classes, officers carried factory ammo that was issued. When 9mm and later .40 became issue only duty ammo was used with very few duds. Both bullets and cases "cooked off" expended velocity quite quickly.
 
Seems to me I recall testing that concluded ammo won't fire in a fire. Just melts.

Three people hit by one totally random shot? Whole story strikes me a balony.
Click to expand...

I know the tests that your referring to, these were huge tests conducted with firefighter saftey in mind, like how to handle a blaze at a gunstore etc. Your partly correct about the bullets just kinda popping out of the shell and melting. This is because they were loose bullets in boxes. A cartridge set off by heat INSIDE of a gun barrel will share all the lethality of a firing pin striking the primer. No barrel equals no pressure equals no velocity. The barrel is the defining factor in making a bullet lethal.
 
Make sure your roscoe is DROP SAFE.

Over your lifetime you are more likely to drop a gun than to be in a shootout.

If it's not drop safe, chamber empty is the way to go.

Deaf
 
I've dropped a pistol twice... Same one.

A different pistol embarrassingly ejected it's magazine in public. Somehow the side fat, or a jean rivet depressed the mag release.... I no longer carry that firearm.
 
Some years ago, a gun shop in the area burned down. There were lurid newspaper reports of firefighters ducking flying bullets, dozens of people wounded, buildings "riddled", etc.

When insurance adjustors and the fire marshal (anti-gun but honest) investigated, not one bullet hole was found and no one could be found who was hurt. Between the fire personnel who heard "popping" and the press, the whole bullet story was simply invented. The news media, of course, never published a correction, since the disaster story went along with an anti-gun agenda.

Jim
 
My conclusion is that the Cobra derringer, which is of the Remington pattern, was being carried without the awkward crossbolt safety engaged. When dropped, it went off as the type is known to be subject to.

We had a dropped derringer case like that here. Except that it was probably a domestic dispute that everybody was very suddenly sorry about, so a story was made up to fit.

I and a couple of others were once slightly cut by bullet fragments when a nitwit came off an indoor range carrying a still-loaded pistol like a pail of water. When he dropped one into the concrete floor, we got spattered with bullet bits. Fortunately the indoor-outdoor carpet contained most of it.

One of my souvenirs of my house burning is a scorched can of black powder. Another is a blackened whisky bottle. Contents of both were fine. :D
 
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