Ten of the 29 guns found by TSA agents this week at airports around the country. Not counting the AR-15 at LAX.

Ten of the 29 guns found by TSA agents this week at airports around the country. Not counting the AR-15 at LAX.

Rough week this time around. Just one gun cleaning accident, thankfully. But four cops involved in accidental discharges, four home invasion shootings, six hunting accidents, two injuries caused by dropped guns, two guns that accidentally went off in the carriers' pockets, one gun forgotten and left behind in a school bathroom, and one gun accidentally fired at an airport checkpoint (not the one intentionally fired at LAX).

That last incident happened at the Bismarck, North Dakota airport (where they know what they're doing with their guns). Now, one way to see this is that a forgetful fellow, who just happened to be traveling as a law-abiding citizen toting his trusty shotgun, had a little mishap in unloading the weapon so he could check it safely for the flight. But another way to look at it is that just one day before the LAX shooting, a man walked into an airport with a loaded shotgun and fired it. And this was actually a relatively slow week in terms of the number of guns found on passengers, with just 29 found. Sure, there was no intent to do any harm on the part of the gent in Bismarck. But then again, who waits until they get to the airport to unload a shotgun they want to take on an airliner with them?

Two other incidents of note are illustrative of other important principles of gun safety. First, from Anchorage, Alaska, an active duty military man, leaving his base to meet his family for lunch, accidentally shot himself with his personal weapon. Much has been made of military policy on carrying weapons on-base, after the shooting incidents at Ft. Hood and at the Washington Navy Yard, for instance. But this story tells us a little something about why the military prefers that even well-trained active duty personnel not carry weapons unnecessarily. Because this guy's leg is perfectly fine and hole-free so long as the military's policy governs his behavior. But as soon as he walks outside the gates and exercises Teh Freedomz, POW!

The second incident reminds us once again that although gun safety training for children is thought to reduce the number and frequency of accidents, it is not magic. The father of the 12-year-old boy tragically lost in Pratts, Virginia, last week made a point of noting that he'd been trained in gun safety. We don't know all the details of how this accident happened, of course. But we know it did. And we are reminded by it of the death of another young child in central Virginia in late May, a 10-year-old girl accidentally shot by her 13-year-old brother, also described as having been trained in gun safety.

The child victims of GunFAIL were, unfortunately, rather more numerous this week. They were ages 3, 3, 4, 5, 6, 12, 12, 13, 15 and 17. Meanwhile, there seems to be no stopping the rash of guns found in schools, either, with weapons found this week in Oswego, Illinois; Kansas City, Kansas; Greenfield, Indiana; Gig Harbor, Washington, and; Harvey, Illinois.

Below the fold, the latest compilation.