CamoTherapy: Andy NEVER Misses

For several reasons (high cost, difficult portability, lack of a power source on my wheelchair), I don’t use a motorized bracket that would allow me to aim a rifle by myself. As the video in my previous CamoTherapy post demonstrates, I rely on assistance from a “point man” to aim while we both view the sight picture in my scopecam monitor. I then decide when to squeeze the trigger with my sip-activated control.

Ron Wagner—my lifelong friend, hunting buddy and most trusted point man—jokingly defines The Point Man Rule. “When we take a deer, Andy gets all the credit,” he says. “If we miss, it’s all my fault.”

In 2011, I went on a hog hunt in Uruguay without my scopecam because the batteries quit holding a charge. (I’ve since found replacements.) I asked my guide, Laurindo, to shoulder the .243 and aim normally, and then tell me when to squeeze.

We had a target-rich environment because feral hogs of all sizes swarmed the bait sites. We killed four hogs in three days, but this video (filmed by my aide Alex) shows the ones that got away. First we—that is, I—score a perfect head shot on a 100-pound boar. Then we—I mean, Laurindo—buries a bullet in the dirt and scatters a bunch of 60-pounders like roaches scurrying from a kitchen light flicked on at midnight. He provokes a stampede with the next shot, then splits the difference between two boars, and, for the grand finale, overshoots a fat sow to kick up a geyser in the pond.

In Laurindo’s defense, the scope had somehow gotten knocked out of alignment; after a few minutes at the shooting bench he was back on target.

Andy Hahn

Born and raised in Pennsylvania, Andy Hahn now resides in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. When he was diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS, or Lou Gehrig’s disease) in 2006, he refused to let the crippling illness undermine his sense of humor or diminish his passion for the outdoors. His insights as a disabled hunter prove valuable to all sportsmen, regardless of physical condition.