no, not a wad, he hit the bird right before just like normal, not a blooper...

i brought up a double charge, and he said no, and i kinda figured the same, as it would be tough to even get the wad to seat correctly, it would stick out of the top of it before being crimped... you would have to be blind to not see it... plus you would likely see it sticking out after the crimp possibly...

there are a couple theories we have..

his theory is possibly that the chamber just gave out after hundreds of thousands of shells gone through it...

i suppose...

here are my theories..

but there is another issue, right before he started shooting, he had the barrel rested on his foot, and was trying to put on his glasses, and it was still frozen out here on Saturday at 9:30 AM, and, he dropped it... i was watching when it happened and you could hear it his the concrete HARD, and he yelled out "OH SH!T" when it happened... that was probably a "i just [Bleeeeep!] my favorite gun up" tone i think...

it hit the concrete hard enough to dent the aluminum ring that goes around the butt plate and connects to the stock, and it dented it pretty good...

he fired 2 shots before it blew up, so if it turned and hit the top of the reciever, it could have cracked it possibly then the 2 shells started the process, 3rd kaboom...

or, the wad wasnt pushed in all the way down to the powder, and there was a sufficient air gap that created a detonation vs combustion...

the secondary explosion from the gases in a detonation would cause the pressures to rise to 30k+... no shotgun can withstand that pressure whatsoever...

another guy that is an ex olympian shooter, suggested that if he oiled his "sliders"? reloading that maybe oil got in the shell? he said no... i guess the other guy witnessed just that, a guy was reloading, and oil got in there with the powder and created more of a fuel, and it blew the guys arm off almost to the elbow...

whatever it was, it was scary as hell, i will never forget that sound, and i hope to never hear it again...

snit, it "was" a Franchi 2005 from the 70s, had both the single trap barrel and the O/U barrel... "was" a very nice, fairly expensive shotgun...