Ideas on how this happened?

C

CommandoX

New member
Had an interesting situation at the range today.

One of the R.O's at my local public range called me over this afternoon to look at a nice ladies Sig P something or other in .380 that seemed to be jammed up. He was unable to get the slide to come back and was unsure as to what to do.

Luckily, I've encountered this scenario a few times before and twice with my P07 Duty and my own improperly created 9mm rounds. (heheheh I said duty)

I looked at the gun carefully and realized that there was "something" caught in the chamber that was not allowing the gun to be opened by manual manipulation. I explained to the R.O and the nice lady that they had 2 options as to how it would be opened and she agreed that I should try it first. I put the gun on the bench (wood) at an angle that would only allow the upper to move with pressure on the lower and pushed. Sure enough it opened up and what did we all see????

A .380 case, fired, empty looking at us. I took it out with a pair of pliers from my range kit and took the pistol apart. Everything looked fine. No visible damage anywhere. I tried to put the gun back together but was stopped by some procedure (I'm guessing) with the slide and the grip. The lady stated that it was fine because she wanted to clean it and I recommended that if it didn't go back together after the cleaning she either contact Sig for a potential repair job or contact a local gunsmith.

So, long story short....can anyone tell me how they think a .380 Winchester piece of brass found it's "fired" way into her chamber with the neck facing me?
 
Sounds like a failure to eject. Possible causes are a dirty chamber, weak ammunition, damaged/defective ejector or extractor or a poor grip. Or a combination of two or more of the above.

Most of the time this would result in weak and/or erratic extraction, but it's possible for the case to end up back in the chamber area where it could cause a stovepipe. Or much more rarely, it might end up bouncing back it the chamber area oriented just perfectly to go back into the chamber.

I'm guessing that this was the last round in the mag, or perhaps she was firing it without a magazine in place.
 
backwards

I've spent a fair amount of time on firing lines, and have never heard of, or seen, a spent case ending up backwards stuck in a chamber after a shot, but stuff happens, and there it was, you saw it.

My immediate reaction was somebody put it there. One idea was the issue was initially a fail to eject/stovepipe,and in an attempt by someone to clear that failure, the case got bobbled into the chamber, reversed, and the slide slammed forward onto it...... stuck. Another thing I have seen is folks loading spent cases in a magazine to effect a failure......to practice immediate action drills. If such was ongoing at the time, I suppose a spent case could have been placed in the mag backwards........then got slammed into the chamber......stuck.

Next, it would take extraordinary timing, but as JohnKsa, noted, weak ejection could leave a spent case in just such a position to get rammed back in the chamber......but that would almost have have to involve the next live round up as well, and the timing seems near improbableble, but stuff happens.

Interesting that the involved party made a comment about cleaning the pistol.......wonder if she'd ever had it apart....thus dirty.....thus inducing failure as noted.

A "P" series SIG should go back together easy enough.....no idea why it would't reassemble....if the pistol was decocked, the hammer would not easily allow the slide to travel fully rearward...but I would think that would be readily apparent.
 
I've actually seen that malfunction once with a SIG P226. We were doing stoppage drills with empty cases mixed into the magazine. Someone put the case backwards in the SIG magazine and when it went in the chamber, it was stuck good!
 
A "P" series SIG should go back together easy enough.....no idea why it would't reassemble....if the pistol was decocked, the hammer would not easily allow the slide to travel fully rearward...but I would think that would be readily apparent.
Click to expand...

The P238 requires a thumb on the ejector as you put the slide back on, but that is pretty easy to see. Don't know about bigger Sigs, either.
 
I've spent a fair amount of time on firing lines, and have never heard of, or seen, a spent case ending up backwards stuck in a chamber after a shot, but stuff happens, and there it was, you saw it.
Click to expand...

I imagine it would be rather rare, indeed. However I had a rifle that would actually do that. It was an HK 91! And no, don't ask me how, as despite decades of shooting and small arms training, including USAOC&S school, I have no idea how it did it.

But, it would do it, and would do it repeatedly, if the rifle was fired as fast as possible. About round 6-7, firing as fast as possible, a fired case would be rotated 180 degrees, and fed into the chamber, base first. Instant jam.

Oddly enough, when the rifle was fired slower, (even fairly quickly,) it NEVER did it.

When the stars line up, and the entrails are favorable, these kind of weird things sometimes happen.
 
It sounds like it could have been a weakened extractor that might have lost its grip on the rim, allowing the rear of the case to slip downward and then the retracting slide caught the case mouth and flipped the case backwards.
Just a guess, though.
 
I have seen that happen one time. The gun was a .44 AMT, which, as most of us know, uses what is essentially a rimless .44 Magnum case.

In this instance what appeared to have happened is that the gun fired one shot normally. Only one shot had been fired and there was one bullet hole in the target. Extraction and ejection were normal, but the recoil was so heavy that the gun literally "caught up" with the ejected case which allowed that case to enter the chamber backward. It was the case that kept the next round from loading, giving the appearance of a mis-feed. (The chambered case was invisible, since the open end was to the rear; close inspection was needed to even see the case - we thought at first that the head had blown out and it was not until the case was pushed out from the front that it was realized what had to have happened.)

At that time, I was pretty sure such a thing had never happened before and would/could not happen again. But.....

Jim

Added later: In looking at the situation reported here, I see one common factor which might have a bearing. The shooter of the .44 Magnum was not a woman, but was a very slight young man. I suspect that in both cases, the shooter's grip was not firm enough and/or the hands and arms were not heavy enough to resist recoil allowing the gun to move upward fast enough to "catch up" with the ejected case.

JK
 
Hey all, I appreciate the replies and ideas.

For further informational purposes...upon reflection n' thinkin.

It was a Sig 290 R in .380 cal.
The mag still had rounds in it at the time of the malfunction.

To clarify, this was the first time I've ever seen this malfunction. When I noted similar activity with my CZ I was only referring to the upper being jammed and being opened in the "table push" manner.
 
Could have indicated it was a squib load....I would have first checked the bore to see if it was not sufficient charge to get the bullet out the muzzle.
 
I experienced something similar years ago. I was carrying a Glock 22 .40 cal. After firing the first round, a second pull of the trigger resulted in a melancholy "Click", rather than the expected "Bang". The empty case had reentered the chamber, primer forward. I don't recall having seen such a malfunction before it happened to me and I am happy to report that I have not experienced such a malfunction since........
 
Stove piped round but the .380 is so short the brass slid back into the chamber rather than jamming up the slide. I've never experienced anything like that but I'd bet money that's what happened.
 
QUOTE: "...I'm guessing that this was the last round in the mag, or perhaps she was firing it without a magazine in place."

^^^ This. It is hard to believe that a case could do a 180 after being fired and end up lodged in the chamber if the next round in the magazine was pushing up under the pressure of the mag's spring, trying to enter a now re-occupied chamber. :confused:
 
I would have said the same thing about the .44 AMT incident had I not been there. Any other explanation for a fired case, backward in the chamber while a fresh round tried to feed into the chamber will be welcome.

Jim
 
In the final analysis, whatever causes any jam is less important than knowing how to quickly clear the gun and being able to continue.
Jams, especially with auto loaders, are to be expected.
Knowing what to do next is what matters.

I was recently watching a video from a major action type match and the shooter could be clearly seen very smoothly clearing his pistol from an obvious jam.
After the completion of the course of fire, when the RO congratulated him on his skill in doing so, the shooter couldn't remember even having a jam, let alone clearing it.
That's the goal.
 
Hi, dgludwig,

Maybe, but without high speed photos, it is pretty hard to figure out just what did happen. In the situation with the .44 AMT, the case had to have entered the chamber before the bolt tried to push the next round in, as the chambered brass kept the next round from entering the chamber.

Hi, g. willikers,

You wrote, "In the final analysis, whatever causes any jam is less important than knowing how to quickly clear the gun and being able to continue."

In other words, keep firing; don't worry about what caused the jam, or whether the gun is still safe, or if the next shot will blow up the gun or injure or kill someone - keep shooting at that piece of paper, no matter what.

I am not a novice at pistol shooting, but I have seen too many accidents (some of which could have had fatal results) because someone playing a game on a range thought that continuing to fire was more important than safety. The idea of "clearing a jam" and getting off the next round may be necessary in a real gun fight (I confess I have never been in such), but it is hard to see the necessity when on a range and bullets (hopefully) are flying in only one direction.

Jim
 
I finally keyed into the important Bart.

Winchester. Was that th
low recoil​
Winchester loading in the red box? It doesn't have the energy to properly eject.

Don't ask me how it could happen, but imagine a stovepipe that managed to flip 180 before the new round was picked up

I worked with mine for a few minutes just now, and it would be impossible.:confused:
 
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