From Police Magazine:

A Doral, FL, police sergeant had to be airlifted to the hospital after suffering a gunshot wound to the chest at the Miami-Dade Public Safety Training Institute in Doral. The firearms exercise was not supposed to include live ammunition, reports the Miami Herald.

The bullet pierced a lung and broke some bones but miraculously missed 29-year-old Sgt. Eric Fernandez's heart by only two inches, according to a law enforcement source familiar with the incident.
Fernandez was moved from intensive care into a room at Jackson Memorial Hospital on Thursday and is recovering, reports the Miami Herald.


Fernandez is an 11-year veteran of the department, and he is a patrol officer and a field training sergeant, police said. Doral Police spokesperson Rey Valdes described Fernandez as "a great guy all around," reports WSVN. "He is a family man. He has a child and another one on the way," he said. "We ask to keep them — Eric and his family — in your prayers."
Doral Police Chief Hernan Organvidez made a brief statement outside the training facility Wednesday afternoon. "An investigation into the training incident misfortune is being conducted by the Miami-Dade Police Department at this time," he said. "There's always hazards in anything we do. I would like to know how it happened in order to avoid any circumstance like this in the near future."
https://www.policemag.com/5168...c_id=6234I2823512C4Z

Damn, I pray he makes a complete recovery. Someone's in some big trouble.

Saw that report elsewhere, but thanks for the reminder.

Hopefully the details will be provided at some point. Yes, “Follow the ‘four’ rules, and such things couldn’t happen,” but in law enforcement training that’s not always useful advice or practicable. What is useful is knowing and analyzing what resulted in the accident and addressing that cause.

I have been almost 50 years in the business and am perplexed that it happens in a department or academy somewhere in the U.S. every year with monotonous regularity. Thank goodness the sergeant was not killed.

"training incident misfortune"

That explains it.

Did something like this just happen in central Florida not that long ago? I think in Orange county.

I think a civilian woman died in a similar incident in FL about three years ago.

where did the bullet come from?
self inflicted, ?
another student?

i sure I will get flamed for this but here it is.

Human's make mistakes every single minute of every single day. It happens. Not making excuses. But it is reality.

It can be this or Doctors preforming surgeries, Pilots operating planes, people driving cars,
Police operations, On the railroad, you name it. People make mistakes.



Some of those mistakes have very little impact on other's and some have terrible affect. And everything in between. Again, that is just reality. Nothing will ever fix that.

It is going to happen plain and simple.

Hope he makes a full recovery.

hate to hear this. not much detail.

i hope he makes a full / speedy recovery.

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quote:

Originally posted by old rugged cross:
i sure I will get flamed for this but here it is.

Human's make mistakes every single minute of every single day. It happens. Not making excuses. But it is reality. Some of those mistakes have very little impact on other's and some have terrible affect. And everything in between. Again, that is just reality. Nothing will ever fix that.

It is going to happen plain and simple.

I don't see any need for flames. if it was negligence / stupidity that's one thing.

but as you state there is inherent risk in doing 'dangerous' things - even in training. Can we strive to eliminate all accidents? Of course.

But realistically - people can / will get hurt in training when you push the envelope.

my Army experience involved lots of training at night w/ vehicles and aircraft, NVGs, jumping out of planes, operating around helicopters, firing weapons, etc.

People get hurt sometimes even in 'just' training. even killed. it's not a desk job. there is a price for realistic training as we all know.


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quote:

Originally posted by old rugged cross:
... snip...

I understand what you are saying. I think you would also agree that when the stakes are higher more care/caution/focus should be placed on the task at hand. Incidents happen and when they do, they should be investigated in hopes that future incidents can be reduced or eliminated.

Many also don't understand the difference between an incident and an accident when discussing safety related issues. AccI dents can't be mitigated to reduce numbers, incidents can....

I agree with both of you wholeheartedly.

We used simunitions when conducting force on force training...the guns were dedicated to this training and were not just a barrel swap and simmunition (8mm paint bullets). Everyone was searched twice before being allowed into the training area. No real guns, no real ammo, no pepper spray, no tasers, and no backup guns...and stupid shit still happened, people were accidentally shot when clearing the training guns for the next bunch...people shot when guns were supposedly free of simunitions, it goes on...

In my career I saw three people ,myself, get shot (with simunitions) due to stupidity.and it happened to each group on different days....it didn’t take long to figure out who to avoid while at live fire training. And to always wear your vest.

Edited for clarity..added bold

This message has been edited. Last edited by: MikeinNC,

I've never participated in an LE training exercise, but am wondering if they do a "pre-surgical pause" or "sterile cockpit" equivalent. In surgery and aviation, there is usually a short period of time where the team/crew is ready to perform the task, but everyone stops. No extraneous conversations, outside tasks, etc. Everyone focuses on the upcoming task and the team leader goes through a final series of checks before proceeding.

The police are the worst hazard at the range. They've become desensitized I suppose.
When chit happens its put off as "part of the job".
I hope the officer recovers well.

Its a fact if you removed all forearms and live ammunition, this would be impossible.

As a past FI and having assisted at Academy Qual's etc for 20+ years, its a wonder I still have my sanity. IMHO the Academy folks were the scariest. Too much pressure on the recruits to perform as well as qualify. When the focus should be on educating them on SAFETY as well as HOW and WHY your SIG 229 works as it does.

Saw quite a few close calls. But luckily no major wrecks on my watch. DID have a Trooper have am AD and put a hole in my patrol car fender though! THAT is quite a story. LOL.

SAFETY and CONTROL of your weapon has to be ingrained in LE. As familiarity does breed contempt.

Many, and perhaps most LE agencies use real weapons during training, and, I suspect, most training also involves handling them as they would during a real incident, i.e., they get pointed at people. There should be no reason to pull triggers, but some trainers may disagree to avoid “training scars.”

There are several ways live rounds are inadvertently fired during LE training.

1. Drifting into informal training. Someone may be involved in another activity, but then decide to make a training point with a firearm and forget that the session didn’t start with the normal safety procedures. I suspect something like that happened a couple of years ago when an instructor shot a cadet in the chest and killed her in a classroom setting.

2. Similar to the above, sometimes an officer may not intend to participate in training and therefore not be subject to the safety checks. Later, however, he becomes involved an no one remembers that his weapon wasn’t cleared.

3. Leaving and returning later. This has been implicated in more than one documented training accident. Everyone is carefully checked at the start of a session, but then someone leaves, loads up, and then returns later without going through a safety check.

4. An officer might be subject to being dispatched to a call (common in small agencies) and is permitted to carry a loaded handgun because he’s using an unloaded long gun for the exercises.

5. If weapons must be disassembled to attach a Simunitions slide, being required to pull the trigger before removing the real slide could create a hazard in a crowded environment when everyone else is doing the same.