sword demo gone wrong

Posted by: bcihak

sword demo gone wrong - 07/22/08 09:59 PM

I have a story. Back in the late eighties I went to a karate tournament given primarily by Robert Triases organization. It took place in Shaumberg Illinois in a hotel near the woodfield mall. An instructor was demonstrating cutting with the japanese sword. He had three cutting targets, one to the front and one to each side. He cuts the first target and sheaths his sword. He turned to his right, drew the weapon and cut the second target. As he cuts, the sword comes out of the hilt and flies two rings away, they had been cleared for the demo, hits the carpet, stands upright and then fell to the carpet. Needless to say it was quite the sight. Was anyone out there also there when this happened. It was primarily an okinawan tournament. If you saw the sword fly out you would remember it. Let me know.
Bill
(hey crabman)
Posted by: Ronin1966

Re: sword demo gone wrong - 07/22/08 11:20 PM

Hello Bill:

The little pin that holds the blade to the two "handles" is notoriously fragile. Dave Lowry wrote about an even worse outcome of an incident (identical nature) in one of his columns

Jeff
Posted by: TKD_X

Re: when bo forms go wrong - 07/28/08 04:17 PM

i hope that never happens to me! i don't do cutting demos, only forms, but usually with lots of people around! here's a similar story:

i went to a local tournament run by a nearby tang soo do school. everything was going pretty good. i was a little less than pleased with winning only 2nd in forms. i don't remember why i wasn't sparring, but i've never been a fan of point-sparring. so anyway it was time for the weapons division. it was my first time competing in weapons. at the beginning it seemed as though the judges were gonna split us into traditional and creative weapons forms. in the end, they split up into boys and girls.it was only my school and the host school's students who were doing any weapons. me, my brother, and a boy from the host school were in one group, a friend from our school and 2 girls from the host school were in the other.

we agreed it should be ladies first. so they all three of them went and got scored. i believe it was the girl from our school and one from the host school that tied for 1st. the girl from our school had done bo and the girl from the host school had done her creative kama form...but, because they tied, they would be allowed to do the same form over or do a different one. this included switching weapons. so the girl from the other school decided to switch to her creative bo form. it included many BIG horizontal swings. guess where our ring was. right next to the audience. guess what separated the audience from the ring. traffic cones. next thing anyone knew it was bo swing+traffic cone= bo staff in 2 big pieces, and one small piece. one big piece fell, the other stayed in the girl's hand and the small piece flew and hit a spectator an inch from his eye! he was ok; they called the paramedics just for extra precaution. the girl was a little frenzied, but she was ok in the end too.

everyone was ok, but those of us who hadn't gone were extremely nervous now. they made the ring twice as large before we went. the first person to go in our division was the boy from the other school. he had an impressive creative bo form, but he dropped his staff inches away from me halfway through his form and had to start over. my brother went next without any problems. i was a little rattled from all the weapon mishaps and was nervous cause my form had a bunch of rather powerful swings. but i managed to get up in front of the judges, said my little introduction (judges: my name is xyz from xyz school, with your permission i will perform xyz form).

everything went fine, i kept my bo under total control during the swings. the crowd was certainly freaked out and gasped whenever my bo whistled. i had good ki-haps and strong stances. i won first place for the first time ever (the guy who dropped his bo got last).

nowadays whenever it's time for the weapons division, everyone clears a huge space and the judges move their chairs way back.

always keep control of your weapons kids.

-TKD_X
Posted by: sunspots

Re: when bo forms go wrong - 07/29/08 04:29 PM

My school attends tournaments at another school of our style which used to make its home in a mall. but the ceilings of the dojo were very low, and any weapon longer than kamas or tonfas had to go out into the mall proper to compete. It was not a very busy mall, and we never displaced anyone, but it was a stone floor. Saw a guy with a staff smack it full length on the stone floor, and splintered it right up the center without going into two pieces. He had to change his grip to keep the thing together, and finished 3rd of three as I recall.

My Sifu was performing with katana and wakasashi at a tournament once, and ws doing absolutely the best performance I'd ever seen. He was almost to the end, when he went to draw the katana, and missed the proper grip somehow. The tip of the sword dropped and it bounced up and out of his hand and between two of the judges. Fortunately no one was behind them. Sifu made sure no one was injured, retrieved his weapon and bowed out. I cried, because it was such a perfect performance to get spoiled by something like that. (It was a lesson, though, you should never take your abilities for granted.)
Posted by: Triddle

Re: sword demo gone wrong - 01/08/09 01:08 AM

This is why I'll only touch swords with a peened pommel. Or at the very least a full length tang with a screw in pommel. This sword probably had a rat tail tang, many japanese style swords do, they're notorious for breaking.

Swords are perfectly safe if well forged and used responsibly, never trust a sword made of inferior steel (such as stainless steel) or without proper hilt construction.
Posted by: TheCrab

Re: sword demo gone wrong - 01/08/09 09:28 PM

Quote:

(hey crabman)




hi! lol