Corpus Christi, Texas – Vice President Dick Cheney accidentally shot and wounded a companion during a weekend quail-hunting trip in Texas, spraying the fellow hunter in the face and chest with shotgun pellets.
Harry Whittington, a millionaire lawyer from Austin, was in stable condition Sunday in the intensive-care unit of a Corpus Christi hospital. Whittington sent word through a hospital official that he would have no comment on the incident out of respect for Cheney.
The incident occurred Saturday at a ranch in south Texas, where the vice president and two companions were hunting quail. It was not made public by the vice president’s office for nearly 24 hours and then only after the incident was reported by the Corpus Christi Caller-Times on its website Sunday.
Katharine Armstrong, the ranch’s owner, said Sunday that Cheney was using a 28-gauge shotgun and that Whittington was about 30 yards away when he was hit in the cheek, neck and chest.
Each of the hunters was wearing a bright orange vest at the time, Armstrong told reporters at the ranch, about 60 miles southwest of Corpus Christi. She said Whittington was “alert and doing fine.”
Armstrong said emergency personnel traveling with Cheney tended to Whittington before an ambulance – routinely on call because of the vice president’s presence – took him to a hospital in Kingsville. From there, Whittington was flown by helicopter to Corpus Christi about 40 miles away.
Cheney’s spokeswoman, Lea Anne McBride, said the vice president met with Whittington and his wife at the hospital Sunday. Cheney “was pleased to see that he’s doing fine and in good spirits,” she said.
Armstrong said she was watching from a car while Cheney, Whittington and another hunter got out of the vehicle to shoot at a covey of quail. Whittington shot a bird and went to look for it in the tall grass, while Cheney and the third hunter walked to another spot and discovered a second covey.
Whittington “came up from behind the vice president and the other hunter and didn’t signal them or indicate to them or announce himself,” Armstrong said.
“The vice president didn’t see him,” she said. “The covey flushed, and the vice president picked out a bird and was following it and shot. And by God, Harry was in the line of fire and got peppered pretty good.”
Whittington has been a lawyer in Austin since 1950 and has long been active in Texas Republican politics. He has been appointed to several state boards, including when then-Gov. George W. Bush named him to the Texas Funeral Service Commission.
Armstrong, owner of the Armstrong Ranch where the accident occurred, said Whittington was bleeding and that Cheney was very apologetic.
“It broke the skin,” she said of the accident. “It knocked him silly. But he was fine. He was talking. His eyes were open. (The pellets) didn’t get in his eyes or anything like that.
“Fortunately, the vice president has got a lot of medical people around him, and so they were right there and probably more cautious than we would have been.”
Cheney is an avid hunter who makes annual pheasant- hunting trips to South Dakota. He also travels frequently to Arkansas to duck hunt.
“This is something that happens from time to time. You know, I’ve been peppered pretty well myself,” Armstrong said.
The 50,000-acre Armstrong ranch has been in the influential south Texas family since the turn of the last century. Katharine Armstrong is the daughter of Tobin Armstrong, a politically connected rancher who was a guest at the White House and spent 48 years as director of the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association.
He died in October. Cheney was among the dignitaries who attended his funeral.
Cheney was legally hunting with a license he purchased in November, Texas Parks and Wildlife Department spokesman Steve Lightfoot said. The vice president flew back to Washington on Sunday evening.
