A three-year old girl has died in a frightening accident in Tennessee, apparently shooting herself with a real gun she’d picked up instead of a Wii controller.

Earlier in the evening, the girl’s stepfather believed he heard an intruder (or some dogs on his property, depending on the news source), so took his semi-automatic firearm outside to scare them off. Upon his return, he placed the gun on a living room table, well within the little girl’s reach.

The real gun is the one at the top,
the other is a Wii peripheral.

Some time later, she mistook the real weapon for a plastic Wii peripheral and fatally shot herself in the abdomen.

No charges have been filed, but this story illustrates just why those arcade gun-style controllers were always bright orange. And why you shouldn’t leave loaded guns where children can reach them. And why, perhaps, three-year olds shouldn’t play shooter games. This could all have been so easily avoided.