More first time gun buyers?

[Lurks Often]

For you other gun owners out there are you seeing/hearing more first time gun buyers?

Personally I have 3 people talk to me about buying a gun, seems the 3 storms we had here in the Northeast (Sandy, 2011 Halloween snowstorm and the 2011 tropical storm) and the resulting loss of services and looting (primarily Sandy) none of whom had been particularly interested in owning a gun before.

I am also hearing that there have been a lot of new gun buyers in the past year, based in part on some instructors having to double the number of pistol permit courses they teach and even then they don't seem to be able to keep up. (CT law requires a pistol permit to buy a handgun)

[Eleanors38]

1. Is instruction for pistols required even if one does not carry concealed?

If this is a general requirement, then the increased course load suggests a rise in number of gun-owners in Connecticut.

[Lurks Often]

5. in CT a pistol permit is required to simply BUY a handgun,

there is/was a permit to purchase, but since the requirements are the same as a permit to carry, almost nobody got one.

CT is essentially a Shall Issue state, despite the state law reading as May Issue.

So the increase in pistol permit courses would suggest either a lot more first time handgun buyers or first time buyers period.

[Tuesday Afternoon]

2. yes. all sizes, genders, races and ages.

[rightsideout]

3. Yea, kind of thinking of the same thing

And expect more gun buys from new folks as legislators propose more gun laws. Get those guns while you still can.

[ileus]

4. I know lots of first time AR/AK buyers.

But at the moment no first time gun buyers.



I tried to tell a new guy here in our dept to get an AR since August when he started. He kept telling us he didn't have a use for one. He bought an overpriced DPMS this weekend for 4-500 bucks above what he should have.

But the good news is he now has one in his inventory. He also managed to wrangle up 500 rounds of 5.56 and a few more overpriced pmags @40 bucks each.

@ todays prices I'm thinking I may be missing the train by not unloading an AR or SKS, ammo and mags. But then again I may miss the train if I do sell.

It's damned if I do, damned if I don't...

[virginia mountainman]

6. Tomorrow, I am taking an old school friend, out to teach him how to shoot his new handgun..

He had no interest in guns, OR POLITICS, before hand....

.........He does now......

[slackmaster]

7. You should have seen what it was like in Southern California during and after the 1992 L.A. riots

Several of my former college classmates bought firearms for the first time after that mess.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

11. After that, some of the new shotgun owners wanted to take their new home

defense shotguns trap and skeet shooting. Most clubs require a longer barrel...

[Remmah2]

8. Sandy, looting?

Was/is looting much of a problem during Sandy? (Still in progress.)

I've seen very few stories hit the main stream news. Selective omissions?

[Lurks Often]

9. Saw some reporting in the NY papers

regarding looting in Staten Island. The Jersey Shore was also hit with looting, something that did NOT make any news that I saw. I found out about the NJ looting from a friend who has LOTS of law enforcement contacts.

[cmclane28]

10. I think a lot of times it isn't reported

Mainstream media by and large doesn't want anyone to believe that the government can't protect us. It always amazes me the number of people who feel like they don't need to arm themselves because they think the police will be there for them....until something like these events happen to them and then they understand.

[Glassunion]

12. It was isolated, but where it was isolated it was really bad.

"In the month after the storm, the Rockaways’ 100th Precinct saw a whopping 1,020% jump in burglaries. Looters also targeted Coney Island, which had a 171% spike in burglaries, and Staten Island, where break-ins rose 22%."

http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/charged-disposed-sentenced-aggressive-disgraceful-nature-pols-wrote-preying-crisis-book-thrown-article-1.1231223

Some of it was just sickening. A Staten Island Sandy Relief Center was looted and then vandalized on Christmas day. What they did not steal, they destroyed. I'm sure they were just upstanding citizens looking to care for their family.

[spin]

13. We have lots of experience with strong tropical storms and hurricanes in Florida. ...

That's one of the reasons so many own a firearm for home defense in the Sunshine State.

[Lurks Often]

14. Not so much up here

In CT Sandy only really hit the coast bad. For the 2011 Halloween snowstorm power was out in parts of the state for a week amd the same with the 2011 tropical storm and a lot of people wern't prepared, mentally or otherwise, for losing power for such a long period of time.