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ATDM wrote:All the funnies aside, I never have anyone in the room when I chamber a round... Been doing it for 30 years. I had never had any type of unintentional discharge until the XD-S incident. As I was chambering upstairs, one of my kids was in a room downstairs (!) and the other one was in the next room. I always point my gun away from living things (people and pets) — even away from people on another floor, because I am always aware of where they are in relation to me, and toward something that can absorb a bullet.

For 30 years I had been doing it this way on pure reflex, nary an incident... And my cautious ways paid off big time.

The mattress successfully absorbed the bullet (it's still in there), the kids were quite freaked out, and so was I! After 30 years of chambering without firing I didn't expect the loud noise that came out... Especially, inside my own house.

I don't wish this on any of you. After the incident, I made sure my kids were OK and explained to them what happened.

And the silver lining of this whole ordeal is that my kids are now even more cautious and understanding about ALL THE REDUNDANCIES of guns safety protocols and will follow them with even more fervor now.

The lesson here for all of us: you can NEVER be too careful or too redundant, when it comes to gun safety.

Never rush through your safety protocols and work them out to the point of automatism. I don't care, if someone has been dealing with guns for 1 week or for 60 years, unintentional discharge can occur, even if it's only once in a lifetime. And even once is one too many times for me.

I will continue to guide my slides, when chambering rounds at home. I had always done that until I was told by a gunsmith not to guide the slide of an XD-s to avoid a failure to feed... I had ALWAYS guided slides on ALL my guns. Come to think of it, I could have done it even with the XD-S, and then just slightly push the slide forward after the spring stopped.

Those of you, who have an XD-S know what I am talking about: the slide stops short about 1/8 of an inch from fully chambering a round (when the gun's empty, the slide returns all the way, even when guided). When I first bought it, I thought something was wrong with my XD-S and took it to my gunsmith for a consultation. He pulled out 5 other brand new XD-S models (both calibers) and the ALL had the same exact issues. Some of them stopped 1/4 of an inch short of being fully chambered, when he or I guided the slide.

That's when I started snapping it, when chambering even at home. The incident occurred two weeks after the purchase and on the eve of the recall date.

As a father of two kids and one on the way, I don't wish this on anyone.

ATDM wrote:

WinoVeritas wrote:I built a home bullet trap for chambering my CCW for that very reason - past experience with an semi-auto that occasionally fired when chambered. That pistol was stolen, but I never forgot the experience.

Cost to build was less than $25 and beats the heck out of replacing a mattress. 5 gal. bucket is filled with layers of sand and pea gravel, cut 3" hole in lid and bolted toilet neck flange. When chambering, stick pistol muzzle into neck and do the deed. So far no ND's. Use on average once a week, sometimes more. Fairly comfortable it will contain any round fired.

Occasinally fired, when chambered?! So, it happened more than once? What was the make of it and model? Did you try to fix it and it kept happening?

I don't think I'd use it again until it's fixed... Maybe, it was a blessing in disguise that it got stolen.

Thanks for the advice on the trap...