You can get away with your hands intact if you do that using target loads of smokeless powders. I remember once the Sheriff's office had a pistol match for all of the people we usually did business with just so we could keep our hand in. On the firing line to my left was the county judge and he was a pretty good pistol shooter. He shot a Colt Gold Cup and he shot it well because he was a former military pistol shooter. We were on the line together and I heard his pistol make a strange sound when he shot. It just sort of sounded like "punk." I turned to him just as he reached up and racked the slide to eject the empty case and he immediately got on his sights as I said Judge, I don't think you ought to.... BANG. He fired the next shot right into the bullet that had jammed in his barrel as a result of the previous round having only a primer in it to fire the bullet just far enough up the barrel to allow the next one to chamber. I was looking right at that Gold Cup from about three feet away when it fired.
There was a buldge in the slide and barrel just forward of the ejection port and of course, it would not budge to open. It runied that Colt. He sent it back to them but they wouldn't put a new slide and barrel on it because it bent the rails on the frame so bad. I don't know what would have been the result had he been shooting brown box hard ball or some commerical ball stuff. I might not be here if he had or he may not have had a hand or a head for that matter.
Back in the days when Dillion first came out he didn't have all the nice little safety devices on his presses that he has today. There was always a danger when using progressive loading presses and when I'm on that Dillion, I lock the door to my loading room and make sure there is no cell phone down there. I keep all my atention on what I am doing because it is so easy to make an error using them. Today of course, Dillion has neat stuff added to his presses that make them much less likely to throw a double charge than they once were 25 years ago. Or the thing that always happened to me was to run out of primers and load about 50 cartridges before I noticed powder running out of the cases in the finished box. Now when I run out of primers that neat little buzzer goes off and I know to stop and put in more primers. That sucker loads bullets so quick that I am always out of primers it seems.
Those of us that have shot a lot have learned safety habits that have become part of our DNA and no habit is more important than having good ammo and that comes from good (safe) loading methods and techniques. The first time we loose sight of that, we pay the price and that is very often very high. It is why I sometimes get labled being overly cautious by those who haven't seen happen what I have. But I don't know how a man can be too safe around something that will blow your hand or head off. And just like drinking and driving, if you care about your buddy, you don't let him do it even if he gets a little pizzed at you at the time.
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