Category Archives: flashlight

Another Mistaken Identity Shooting and Killing

By tacticalprofessor on

Odds are that the ‘bump in the night,’ has no more than a 3% possibility of being an intruder. The other 97+% is either a family member, friend, or some harmless dumbass.

I calculated this based on information in the National Crime Victims Survey overlaid on several other authoritative sources. The analysis is slightly fuzzy but I stand by the general numbers.

CSU professor accidentally shot by roommate who mistook her for intruder

https://www.wtvm.com/2025/10/14/csu-professor-accidentally-shot-by-roommate-who-mistook-her-intruder/

[Muscogee County Coroner] Bryan said [Professor] Anderson’s roommate had been receiving terrorist threats from her son, including threats of bodily harm and to burn down the house. When the roommate heard a noise while sleeping, she grabbed her pistol and walked into the hallway.

‘She fired one shot and then fired another one and hit her roommate,’ Bryan said.

Calling out “WHO’S THERE” would save many a life. The concept that using a flashlight and/or issuing a verbal challenge will ‘draw the intruder’s fire’ is foolish and unsupportable.

Flashlight skills at home are important enough that I made the flashlight chapter of Indoor Range Practice Sessions a free download on my ebook store.

https://store.payloadz.com/go/?id=2505573

Note also that she was killed by one hit; this is not uncommon when a shooting victim is not highly adrenalized. Modern bullets are very lethal.

If you would like to read more in-depth information about shooting and personal protection, including making good decisions, consider subscribing to my Patreon page.

https://www.patreon.com/TacticalProfessor

Posted in: deadly force, decision making, firearms, flashlight, home defense, Incident Analysis, low light, Negative Outcomes, Serious Mistakes

Close Quarters Handgun Training

By tacticalprofessor on

My latest Shooting Illustrated article is posted.

https://www.shootingillustrated.com/content/close-quarters-handgun-training/

The topic is the ‘Close Quarters Handgun’ class I attended last month. It was taught by Chuck Haggard of Agile Training https://agiletactical.com/ and hosted by The Complete Combatant https://www.thecompletecombatant.com/.

Fair disclaimers up front: Chuck, Shelley, and Brian are all dear friends of mine and I didn’t pay for the class; in fact, Chuck picked up my range fee. Furthermore, I shot the class with the HK CC9 https://hk-usa.com/cc9/ that HK gave me. Chuck called it my “stubby gun,” which it is. Almost everybody else was shooting full size service pistols, most with Red Dot Sights. That said, nobody is paying me for my comments.

If you are interested in more in-depth commentary about shooting and Personal Protection incident analysis, please consider subscribing to my Patreon page. https://www.patreon.com/c/TacticalProfessor

Posted in: concealed carry, deadly force, decision making, flashlight, gunhandling, Living with Guns, skills, training

Home Defense Pistol Skills

By tacticalprofessor on | 3 Comments

My latest Shooting Illustrated article is up.

“In the process of defending one’s home with a pistol, several additional skills beyond marksmanship are useful and necessary. In particular, the ability to move through the home while holding a handgun and techniques to inform the all-important DON’T SHOOT/SHOOT decision are critical.”

https://www.shootingillustrated.com/content/home-defense-pistol-skills

Flashlight skills at home are important enough that the flashlight chapter of Indoor Range Practice Sessions is a free download on my ebook store.

https://store.payloadz.com/go/?id=2505573

Posted in: deadly force, decision making, firearms, flashlight, home defense, Living with Guns, low light, Negative Outcomes, Serious Mistakes, skills

Tactical Conference 2024 – Loot and Looted

By tacticalprofessor on | 2 Comments

At every Conference, Seminar, or industry gathering, the attendees always return with items given away by Presenters and other attendees. TacCon 2024 was no exception; I call this ‘Loot’ and I returned with some good items.

Loot

Books

Good reading material courtesy of Chuck Haggard, my hostess for the weekend, Andy Stanford, and Greg Ellifritz.

Targets and Drills

At the end of Andy Stanford’s Practical Handgun Drills class, he gave us laminated copies of the Surefire targets and a double sided sheet of drills for using them.

Cool Stuff

Yet another doubloon from Andy Stanford was a Surefire Stiletto flashlight, given to all the trainers at the event. Retention Ring gave me a nice laminated card as an aid for adjusting pistol and rifle optics. A friend in the Air Marshal Service presented me with a cool pin and Chuck gave me a unique and apparently one off revolver inert gun.

Looted

Notice that there is no picture of the package of Narcan gifted to me by Greg Ellifritz. That’s because it was ‘liberated’ from my suitcase while in the custody of Frontier Airlines on the trip home. Whether a sticky fingered baggage handler got it or it was ‘seized’ without notice or an inspection tag by the TSA is unknown to me. Sunny Hostin might think the Total Eclipse disintegrated it while in the aircraft’s hold. When I opened the suitcase, I thought things were arranged a little differently. A bit later I realized that the Narcan had taken a walk.

That’s the last time I’ll ever fail to secure my suitcase with a TSA lock and a zip tie. I didn’t feel it was necessary this time because I didn’t have a pistol in my suitcase but it’s a lesson learned.

Many thanks to my friends for their generosity. Whether presenting or attending, there’s always interesting stuff given out at conferences. I’m looking forward to duplicating the Surefire targets and shooting Andy’s drills for them.

In Memoriam to all the heroes of the Miami Massacre, April 11, 1986. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1986_FBI_Miami_shootout

Posted in: flashlight, practice, revolvers, skills, standards, The Library

Energizer® Tactical Metal Flashlight

By tacticalprofessor on | 1 Comment

#flashlightfriday

Small, inexpensive, and readily available flashlights are very useful. I purchased an Energizer 300 lumen Tactical Metal Flashlight https://www.energizer.com/lighting/tactical-metal-flashlights#ENPMHT1L at The Home Depot for $9.98.

The flashlight runs on one 123 battery and has three modes. The high mode is 300 lumens, the output for the low mode is unspecified but may be 30 lumens based on the product literature, and a strobe mode. There are no instructions packaged with it nor on the website but through a process of trial and success, I discovered that it goes into High, then Low, then Strobe by rapidly clicking the button on the tailcap. If the light is left off for about two seconds, it will go back to High mode the next time it is turned on. The switch is capable of momentary flash and the same cycle sequence results.

It has a clip that can easily be reversed for head up or head down carry. Being a one cell light, it’s easily carried in a pocket. There is also a hole in the tailcap that accepts a keyring (not included). This is useful for quickly removing the flashlight when it’s clipped head down inside a pocket.

The TAC 300 has a crenelated bezel but not tailcap. The reason for having a crenelated tailcap has always escaped me so I’m glad of that. The tailcap has a lip to help keep the button from being accidentally depressed but the lip is scalloped enough to provide easy access to the button. I have found that orienting the clip opposite the scallop gives the easiest access when gripping the flashlight.

It is rather bigger than the Surefire Sidekick so it’s more suited to being a pocket flashlight than something to be carried on a keyring.

Overall, a very workable little light that is not expensive. There’s no reason to not have a flashlight next to your pistol when something like this is so readily available.

“Who’s there?”

Tactical Professor Information Products

STOPP Presentation at Rangemaster Tactical Conference
https://tacticalprofessor.wordpress.com/2021/09/14/stopp-presentation-now-available/

https://www.payloadz.com/go?id=3381307

Books (all PDF)

Posted in: flashlight, home defense