Protecting and Securing Firearms
I shouldn’t have gotten in trouble for it but I did get in trouble.
– my cardiologist
I had to make a visit to my cardiologist last week. We had an enlightening conversation about the gun story of his childhood. He comes from a country where there is no gun culture to speak of but double barrel shotguns are sometimes found in rural homes. As a young boy, he visited his uncle’s country house. There, unsecured in a mud room, he found the uncle’s shotgun. Being an intelligent and inquisitive young child, he picked up the shotgun and brought it into the house. The gun was loaded. Fortunately, a family member came from behind him and took the gun away from him before any harm resulted. Then, he got in trouble. Although incidents where a child causes an unintentional discharge tend to be well publicized, the ones where a small child gets hold of a gun but doesn’t fire almost never do. I’m willing to bet there are many many more incidents where the gun doesn’t go off, fortunately.
What probably happens in those cases is the same thing that happened to him; the child ‘gets in trouble’ and is either scolded and/or punished. In our times of constant media bombardment that guns are bad, per se, having an Early Childhood Trauma https://www.nctsn.org/what-is-child-trauma/trauma-types/early-childhood-trauma involving a firearm is likely to prime the platform for that child to dislike and fear firearms. I would call that a long term Negative Outcome for our Second Amendment right.
Advanced Pistol Practice announcement
Because I’ve been asked for it so often, I’ve created a Skill Development practice program that goes far beyond my first two books, Concealed Carry Skills and Drills and Indoor Range Practice Sessions. CCSD and IRPS were intended for newer or inexperienced shooters.
The new Program is called Advanced Pistol Practice. It is intended for those shooters who are familiar with their handguns and are serious about taking their skills, both Technical and Decisional, to a much higher level. Although many people would like to take a high level training course, that’s often difficult or impossible because of resource constraints. While it can’t provide the practiced eye of a good instructor, Advanced Pistol Practice provides shooters with a practice approach similar to those used by many good trainers. It uses an integrated approach to Skills Development incorporating both Live Fire and Dry Practice that is found in many high level training courses.
The Live Fire component consists of Technical Drills, Decisional Drills, and Scenarios. While numerous technical shooting drills are widely available, drills that develop the skill of ‘thinking with a gun in hand’ are much less common. The Decisional Drills included in APP are intended to fill this gap. They consist of both Don’t Shoot/Shoot exercises and target identification/follow-up hit assessment exercises. Scenario shooting should be a part of every shooter’s practice but creating realistic scenarios isn’t always easy. The Live Fire Scenarios in APP are based on actual shootings, gunfights, and gunbattles involving both Private Citizens and Law Enforcement Officers, especially off-duty LE incidents.
Snub revolvers continue to maintain a healthy presence as backup and hideout gun among knowledgeable guncarriers. The Snub Revolver Program Of Instruction that I developed and used for many years is included in APP. Snubs are neither “arm’s length guns” nor “one-shot close range shotguns.” Given a structured practice regimen, shooters can learn to accomplish good work with a snub revolver. Dry Practice exercises for the snub are included in the Program, as well.
Dry Practice is often the most challenging practice component of Skill Development because it tends to be unstructured and boring, leading to unproductive “grabasstic gun-clicking.” To combat this, APP includes a series of different structured audio programs in different voices with different sound effects to keep dry practice focused and interesting. Since the space available for dry practice is usually limited, APP also includes reduced scale targets to facilitate the dry practice.
Proficient shooters are frequently asked by new or prospective gunowners to provide an introduction to shooting. To assist the proficient shooter in setting up a new shooter for success, APP includes a short training outline suitable for those with little experience with firearms. Setting up a new shooter for a productive and enjoyable session is an important part of growing our community. The New Shooter Outline can help a proficient shooter do that.
Recognizing that firearms are periodically involved in unfortunate situations, Advanced Pistol Practice also includes the entire Serious Mistakes and Negative Outcomes recording as MP3 files. The potential personal disasters that can result from poor decision-making and not thinking ahead are often overlooked among firearms owners. Serious Mistakes and Negative Outcomes challenges the gunowner to think ahead and avoid the pitfalls that can occur during ownership and incidents.
Advanced Pistol Practice is more than a book and contains many audio files and graphics. Consequently, it’s not feasible to offer it as a download. It’s available on my webstore in two formats; CD and USB flash drive. The CD version is $19.95, shipped. There’s a $3 additional charge for the USB flash drive option.
https://tacticalprofessor.my-online.store
The Program is about the price of one box of ammunition and will pay for itself many times over by saving time, ammunition, and perhaps even lives.
Neutralize the threat (or not)
“According to the document, Roberts said in the process of leaving the room, he noticed Garcia on the floor at the bedroom doorway and shot him again to ‘be certain he was deceased to eliminate any threat of having another altercation’.”
Big problem. “Neutralize the threat” isn’t always the right course of action.
Roberts is facing first degree murder and manslaughter charges, both felony offenses.
That’s going to be a Negative Outcome.
In the original report about the shooting, it’s unclear whether the two year old boy was killed intentionally or just a downrange failure.
No matter what the Outcome, the shooter’s life has now become a shambles and will be for the foreseeable future.
Book Promo
For those who are interested in improving your pistol shooting skills, my books are available as downloads.
Concealed Carry Skills and Drills downloadable eBook. http://concealedcarryskillsanddrills.com
Indoor Range Practice Sessions downloadable eBook. http://indoorrangepracticesessions.com
Serious Mistakes Gunowners Make, downloadable audio recording. http://seriousgunownermistakes.com
The Tactical Professor gets a laugh
Facebook gave me a good laugh this evening. Last year on this date, I did a podcast on Ballistic Radio entitled Dear Instructor, Get a Real Job. When I linked to it on Facebook, the following message popped up.
It literally made me Laugh Out Loud.
This is the podcast.
I’m not dead serious quite all the time. 🙂
The Medina, North Dakota Shootout
Yesterday was the anniversary of the Medina Shootout. One of the main lessons is how devastating long guns are when used at pistol distances.
Thirty-five years ago today, on February 13, 1983, a violent gunbattle took place in Medina, North Dakota. Although less well known than the Miami Massacre in 1986, it was every bit as bloody and violent. Something it had in common with the Miami Massacre was preparation for conflict and the decisiveness of long guns at pistol ranges.
On one side was a task force of US Marshals and local law enforcement officers. On the other side were members of a local Posse Comitatus group. Casualties were high on both sides. Four months later, a second related encounter, hundreds of miles away, brought more loss of life.
The Prelude
Gordon Kahl was a Midwestern farmer and Federal tax resister. He was a member of a loosely knit organization called the Posse Comitatus. The Posse recognizes no authority above the county level and held many hateful beliefs. He had been imprisoned for…
View original post 513 more words
Revolvers are passé
At least to the general public…
The 2017 BATF production statistics, Annual Firearms Manufacturing and Export Report (AFMER), https://www.atf.gov/file/133476/download have been released. There are some interesting facts about market trends in it. The snub nose .38, which was a long time standard for Personal Protection, has clearly been replaced in popularity by compact .380 ACP autoloaders. This continues a trend that has been building for a decade.
All manufacturers
Total .38 revolver – 177,956
Total .380 autoloader – 848,425
Shoot/Don’t Shoot and METT-TC
Every time we pull a gun on someone, a binary decision, ‘Shoot or Don’t Shoot,’ immediately ensues and continues until the gun is put away. That decision is not necessarily either conscious nor intentional. Because of that, we need to be very mindful of when we choose to place ourselves into that position. Two recent incidents, one involving a personal friend and one involving a gun celebrity, have reinforced that to me. In fact, we probably should change the common usage to Don’t Shoot/Shoot instead of vice versa.
Someone took me to task for criticizing Jan Morgan’s recent interaction with a car burglar. My comment was critical of her issuing commands to the burglar as if she was a POlice. Our objective(s) (METT-TC) as Private Citizens are very different than those who are duty bound to enforce the law vis-à-vis protecting ourselves and our loved ones. We ignore those distinctions at our peril. It’s a downside of taking our personal doctrine directly from the POlice.
The possibility of a Serious Mistake and subsequent Negative Outcome will always be present. That’s why developing our personal doctrine ahead of time, based on our needs and considerations, not someone else’s, is important.
Concealed Carry Skills and Drills downloadable eBook.
http://store.payloadz.com/go?id=2570418
Indoor Range Practice Sessions downloadable eBook.
http://store.payloadz.com/go?id=2501143
Serious Mistakes Gunowners Make, downloadable eBook.
Scaled target rifle qualification
One of the challenges with rifles is evaluating proficiency with limited resources. One approach is the US Army Scaled Target Alternate Qualification Course. The Course is found in Field Manual 3-22.9 . It can be shot on any range that has 25 meters (28 yards) of space. Even if your range only has 25 yards, it’s still a good course; just recognize that the targets are 10 percent closer than the values on the target.
There are three Tables (stages) totaling 40 rounds.
In Fear for My Life is not a ‘Get Out of Jail’ card
‘I was in fear for my life’ has become something of a mantra for those who carry weapons for Personal Protection. However, ‘fear’ has no bearing on whether a shooting is a legal act. Only the ‘reasonableness’ of the act is germane in a Court of Law. Stopping your car, getting out of it, walking back to a school bus behind you, and then shooting at it is unlikely to be viewed in court as ‘reasonable.’
“Lilly told officers that he feared for his safety and that is why he shot at the bus driver.” The responding officer was unimpressed and took the shooter into custody. He is now being charged with Attempted 2nd Degree Murder and other charges.
https://www.hennepinattorney.org/-/media/Attorney/NEWS/2019/Lilly-Kenneth-cplt.pdf
Pure luck and poor marksmanship are the only reason this person isn’t being charged with Murder. As it is, he’s still facing 20 years or more in prison. The prosecutor is planning to throw the book at him and rightly so. That’s a Negative Outcome.
The actions of Mr. Lilly were outrageous and it was sheer luck that neither the bus driver nor the little girl were killed
https://www.hennepinattorney.org/news/news/2019/February/Lillie-Kenneth-attmurdcharge
Not understanding the rules is one of the topics addressed in Serious Mistakes Gunowners Make, my downloadable audio recording. http://seriousgunownermistakes.com
It’s probably just as well that he was no more skilled than what he was.
Concealed Carry Skills and Drills downloadable eBook. http://concealedcarryskillsanddrills.com
Indoor Range Practice Sessions downloadable eBook. http://indoorrangepracticesessions.com
The Tactical Professor’s SHOT Show Odyssey (Part III) – Site visit to the Duel at the Dumbster (continued)
More thoughts about the Duel at the Dumbster
Legal issues aside, the Duel also demonstrated how proxemics come into play during Defensive Gun Uses. Shootings and gunfights involving Private Citizens almost universally occur in Social Space (4-12 feet) as defined in the science of Proxemics. That’s my conclusion after studying the over 5,000 DGUs in my database. When they start out with ‘Monkey Dancing,’ as this one did, it’s unavoidable that the shooting will be close. Monkey Dancing can’t be done at much of a distance. While Law Enforcement Officers need to be concerned about the Tueller Principle, the dynamics of Private Citizen encounters are far different.
Diagram by WebHamster
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