The crew of Alec Baldwin’s movie set were already concerned about gun safety before he accidentally shot and killed cinematographer Halyna Hutchins, and they had walked off the set hours before she was killed, after they complained about long hours, shoddy conditions and two other incidents involving the ‘misfire’ of weapons.
The workers had been complaining about the fact they had to stay overnight in Albuquerque – an hour’s drive from the set – and not Sante Fe because production wouldn’t pay for their hotels, according to sources cited by The Los Angeles Times and multiple social media posts by film and TV insiders.
When they turned up to set to clear their things on Thursday, they found they’d been replaced by locals.
It begs the question of who those local workers were, what their training was and to what extent did they check the weapon before handing it to Baldwin, suspected to have possibly been loaded with a live round.
Deadline also cites an unnamed source who said a gun had gone off ‘in a cabin’ while someone was holding it in a cabin.
‘A gun had two misfires in a closed cabin. They just fired loud pops – a person was just holding it in their hands and it went off,’ they said.
Rust Production LLC did not respond to repeated requests for comment from DailyMail.com on Friday about the incident, but members of the union that represents many of the crew who were involved in the production said they had expressed fears about on-set safety.
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An inconsolable Alec Baldwin is shown, left, yesterday outside the Santa Fe County Sheriff’s Office after accidentally shooting and killing cinematographer Halyna Hutchins, right. They were among few original workers on set after others walked off earlier in the day in a union row
An aerial view of the Bonanza Creek Ranch in Santa Fe, where the movie was being filmed. Workers had been protesting over the fact production wouldn’t pay for them to stay in hotels and motels in Sante Fe, instead forcing them to drive an hour to Albuquerque
Production of the film has stopped now in light of the tragedy. The Santa Fe County Sheriff’s Department is investigating and ‘collecting evidence’, a spokesman said on Friday
Union members vented on social media before the tragedy about the poor conditions on the set of the film. They talked about having to sleep in their cars at the set rather than make the drive back to Albuquerque because they were too exhausted
It is the same union that had been threatened to galvanize an industry-wide strike in protest over poor working conditions including low pay and laxed safety. IATSE Local 44 – whose members were involved in the Rust production – said in a statement to its members that no union members were on the set on Thursday.
One text message that was circulating on social media, shared repeatedly by union members, refers to a ‘walk out’ by staff the day before the tragedy.
The text message claims that Halyna was one of the few people who decided to stay. She belonged to IATSE Local 600 and had been campaigning for better conditions for her team when she was killed.
One person who was involved with the production posted on social media that crew had been sleeping in their cars at the movie set because they were too tired to drive the one-hour back to Albuquerque after grueling days.
The movie does not have a large budget like other productions, and one experienced prop master who was offered the job turned it down because it wasn’t paying enough for her to take the job.
Zak Knight, a pyrotechnic and special effects engineer who is a member of Local 44, told DailyMail.com on Friday that he’d heard from others involved in the production that there was a walk-out.
‘It’s very possible that the union members said “we’re out”, and they brought in people to fill the positions on the fly. There’s a lot of grey area.’
He added that different gun laws between New Mexico and California may have also contributed to the accident. In California, both a trained armorer and a prop master is required on a film set and those are the standards the union adheres to as well.
‘You will find the best and most well-trained individuals in Los Angeles. You can’t guarantee that as you go across the country,’ he told DailyMail.com on Friday.
In the days before the tragedy, IATSE had been threatening a large-scale strike that would have crippled Hollywood production. Among the complaints were overworking staff and poor rates. Baldwin recorded a video of himself encouraging the union members to strike if they felt they needed to, saying studio bosses ‘don’t give a f**k about you’, that the union shared online.
‘There’s a direct correlation between maintaining a safe set and the hours that we work. At a certain time there’s no such thing as a safe set if we’re all exhausted,’ Knight, a special effects artist, said.
Whatever happened in the moments leading up to her death, Knight said it was caused by a ‘cascade of failures’ by multiple people.
‘We have a hard and fast rule that no live ammunition ever goes into a prop truck or set at any time. We just don’t do it.
‘If you see bullets on set they are complete dummy rounds and are in no way functional. This goes back to Brandon Lee. There’s protocol.
‘There should have never been live rounds on a movie set, that’s number one. Number two is every single person on a movie set has a right to inspect a weapon before it’s fired. And number three is, there is no reason to ever put a person in front of a weapon that’s firing.
‘Anytime you see a movie where the barrel is pointed down the camera lens, there should not be an operator behind it. It’s obvious that the considerations of this resulted in that gun being pointed directly at two people.
‘We would have additionally had a barrier between them.
‘A large number of people failed to do our protocols… every accident is a cascade of events,’ he said.
One Santa Fe prop master told Daily Mail that had the gun been checked properly before it was handed to Baldwin, the tragedy wouldn’t have occurred.
‘If they’d done their job checking the weapon this wouldn’t have happened. You show the assistant director the weapon, you show the actor the weapon, you show everybody it’s a safe weapon. There’s a big chain of command that missed an opportunity to save a life.’
Rust Productions LLC has opened an internal investigation into what happened but will not comment on the specifics.
A Sante Fe County Sheriff Department spokesman said on Friday afternoon: ‘The investigation remains active and open. Witnesses continue to be interviewed and evidence collected.’
Baldwin, 63, tweeted on Friday afternoon to say he had spoken with the victim’s husband and that he was fully cooperating with law enforcement.
‘There are no words to convey my shock and sadness regarding the tragic accident that took the life of Halyna Hutchins, a wife, mother and deeply admired colleague of ours.
‘I’m fully cooperating with the police investigation to address how this tragedy occurred and I am in touch with her husband, offering my support to him and his family.
‘My heart is broken for her husband, their son, and all who knew and loved Halyna,’ he said.
He was pictured doubled over in grief on Thursday after speaking to the Santa Fe County Sheriff’s Department.
The workers were angry that they weren’t being put up in Sante Fe, the town nearest the ranch where they were shooting, and instead were being told to drive every night to Albuquerque after long shifts. Some said they were sleeping in their cars at the set to avoid it
Baldwin and Hutchins (circled) are pictured together on the set of Rust, in an image that she uploaded to Instagram two days ago saying the crew of the film were supporting a strike by the IATSE union
Hutchins’ husband Matthew told DailyMail.com on Friday exclusively: ‘I have spoken with Alec Baldwin. He is being very supportive’
The Baldwin family’s nanny was pictured packing up their SUV outside the family’s NYC home on Friday but there was no sign of the actor’s wife Hilaria
Baldwin’s wife Hilaria posted this screenshot of them FaceTiming on Thursday before the tragedy
Hutchins’ grieving husband Matthew told DailyMail.com on Friday morning that he had spoken with the actor.
‘I have spoken with Alec Baldwin and he is being very supportive,’ he said.
Baldwin was heard asking people around him why he’d been handed a ‘hot gun’.
‘In all my years, I’ve never been handed a hot gun,’ he was heard saying.
Last month, actor Jensen Ackles told a conference in Denver how he’d been able to ‘choose’ his own gun from the female armorer in a haphazard training session.
‘They had me pick my gun. They were like, “Alright, what gun would you like?” I was like, “I don’t know”, and the armorer was like, “Do you have gun experience?” I was like, “A little”, she was like, “This is how you load it…check it’s safe. Do you want it hip drawn or cross drawn?” I was like “cross drawn, that sounds fun”.’
‘So she’s like, “I’ll just put some blanks in there and just fire a couple of rounds towards the hill.”
‘I walk out and she’s like, “Just make sure you pull the hammer all the way back and aim at your target”.
‘I was like alright I got it,’ he said. The female armorer has not been named.
It’s unclear where Baldwin is now. There was no sign of his wife, Hilaria, outside their New York City apartment on Friday but a nanny was pictured loading up their SUV.
The production employed ’73 New Mexican crew, 22 New Mexico principal actors, and 230 New Mexico background talent’ according to a press release issued earlier this month.
According to the prop masters’ union email, the ‘Props, Set Decoration, Special Effects and Construction Departments were staffed by New Mexico crew members’ – none of whom belonged to the union.
Actor Jensen Ackles told last month how he’d received haphazard gun training on the film set. He talked about being able to choose his own gun, and how the unnamed female armorer loaded it with blanks then shot it at a hill before asking him how he’d like to draw the weapon and then letting him shoot. A photo he posted from the set is shown, right
An image taken on the set of Rust shows cast and crew members receiving a safety briefing before filming stunts. The image was uploaded to Instagram a week ago
In the days before the tragedy, IATSE had been threatening a large-scale strike that would have crippled Hollywood production.
Among the complaints were overworking staff and poor rates. Baldwin recorded a video of himself encouraging the union members to strike if they felt they needed to, saying studio bosses ‘don’t give a f**k about you’, that the union shared online.
The tragedy is reminiscent of the 1993 accident on the set of The Crow, when Bruce Lee’s son Brandon was shot and killed by a fellow actor.
The film crew in that accident thought the gun was loaded with dummy bullets and blanks, but an autopsy revealed Lee had a .44 caliber bullet lodged in his spine. Investigators in that shooting also probed the theory that a dummy cartridge got stuck in the barrel before the second was fired – a known hazard in shooting which can cause serious injuries or death when the second round is fired.
Rhys Muldoon, an Australian actor who has worked extensively in film and TV, also suggested that a blank misfiring close to the camera could have caused Thursday’s accident – telling the BBC that material from the blank round could have struck Hutchins before causing part of the camera to hit Souza.