A 2-year-old boy in North Carolina is expected to survive after shooting himself with his father’s gun over the weekend.

Randolph County deputies said that the toddler found the handgun in his parents’ room at their home just outside Asheboro around 2 p.m. on Saturday. The boy put the gun in his mouth and fired it.

According to WGHP, the boy was listed in critical condition Brenner Children’s Hospital in Winston-Salem on Sunday, but was expected to live.

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“The bullet missed all the vital arteries there in the neck in the head and also missed the spinal cords, so I said it’s a miracle the child is still with us,” Randolph County Sheriff’s Office Captain Derrick Hill explained to WGHP.

A neighbor told the station that “the good Lord was looking after him.”

The sheriff’s and district attorney’s offices were considering whether to charge the parents with leaving the firearm unattended.

Watch this video from WGHP, broadcast May 19, 2013.

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[Stock photo via Shutterstock.com: “Young toddler boy aiming a water gun.”]