US county named 'area of outstanding natural stupidity'

The Register recently promised to name Washington's Kitsap County 'an area of outstanding natural stupidity' if it could reach a critical mass of firearms-related idiocy.

That mass is three idiotic gun related incidents, and Kitsap has now made the grade.

In 2007, an unnamed 66-year-old from Southworth was repairing a Lincoln Continental, and decided the best way to remove a stubborn wheelnut was with a 12-gauge shotgun. Blasting it "from arm's length", he was "peppered with ricocheting buckshot and debris". Cue a visit to Tacoma General Hospital with "severe but not life-threatening injuries".

Earlier this month, Kitsap took one step closer to glory when the owner of a car-wrecking yard in Bainbridge Island blew up $80,000 of fireworks he was storing for Fourth of July celebrations. An early-morning test of a new rifle proved ill-advised, when a ricochet flew off a scrapped car, penetrated a container packed with the incendiaries, and set off "the greatest fireworks show you ever would have wanted to not see".

The third episode that triggered Kitsap's elevation to glory involved a nine-year-old lad who accidentally shot his eight-year-old female classmate. The gun apparently "discharged from the boy's backpack" at school. His parents are separated, and he allegedly "got the gun from his mother's boyfriend when he was visiting her".

The Register is not suggesting the poor kid himself is responsible for Kitsap's classification. That honor should go to his mom, for her outstanding parenting skills.