Self-Defense & Firearms News

 Just some articles I recently came across:

• The Notes from KR blog regularly has articles describing various law enforcement qualifications courses. He often includes some other information, including links to where he obtained his targets. A few of the qualification courses he's shot over the past couple of months:
• "Shooting the New Jersey carry permit qual course"
• "Shooting the LAPD Combat Qualification"
• "Shooting the Stephenville PD Qualification Course"
• In a similar vein: "Hunter Constantine Draw Drill: Cold Start" by Hunter Constantine, The Mag Life. Constantine relates why he created his drill: "The Hunter Constantine Draw Drill focuses on your fundamental mental skills and marksmanship. The foundation of this drill is your processing power — how well your brain can pick on minute differences and correct them within the given time frame." Also: "The drill uses the headbox of a USPSA target and will incorporate 10 individual draws. The target is to get all 10 rounds into the alpha zone of the headbox. You will adjust the time or distance you’re shooting depending on your skill level. This drill’s highest goal is 1.50 second par time at 10 yards." As for the drill:

On the audible beep, the shooter will engage the USPSA head box with one round. The shooter will repeat this for 10 strings. The shooter must complete all 10 strings before trying the drill again. The drill is passed when the shooter gets all 10 shots in the alpha zone of the headbox. Repeat the drill until passed.

Constantine indicates that he will start students at shorter distances than 10 yards with longer par times (e.g., 5 yards with a 2.5 second par time) and then increase the distance or decrease the part time until hitting that above.

• "How I Survived A Home Invasion" (Part 1) (Part 2) (Part 3) by Mr. Y, Survival Blog. Basic story is that the guy realized someone was at his front door. He grabbed a handgun (in a holster) and took it with him to his front door to investigate with the holster and gun in his left hand. When he got the front door he saw a stranger stepping off his porch and apparently heading down the walk and away from this door. Nevertheless, he opened the door and asked the guy if he could help him, at which time the stranger returned the front door and forces his way inside the house, ultimately resulting in his being shot. An excerpt:

    I let go of the screen door handle and yank the pistol out of the holster that I’m holding in my left hand. As I do this I start stepping backwards away from the door to buy myself time to get the gun out of the holster. The Bad Guy pulls the door open and advances into the house. He starts coming towards me as I’m fading back into my living room. At no point we’re we ever more than three or four feet apart. When the gun clears the holster, and I’m backpedaling, I discard the holster and bring the gun up to a two-handed low ready position. There’s no time to tell him to stay back, and if he sees the gun he gives no indication of it. He continues lunging towards me. There’s no time to bring the gun up out of the low ready, there’s no time to use the sights, and the distance is so close that there’s no real need for the laser. We’re close enough that we could reach out and touch each other…which is something I did not want. The last thing I wanted was to get into a clinch with this guy, us rolling around on my living room floor fighting over a pistol.

    There’s a moment of hesitation as the thought comes into my head that, once I pull the trigger, my life is never, ever going to be the same. The thought that, somehow, I might get into huge legal trouble also runs through my head. All of these thoughts occur simultaneously in the blink of an eye. I pull the trigger once, he crumples forward, still coming towards me, and almost immediately I follow up with two more shots…pop, pause, pop, pop. He hits the floor at my feet, rolls onto his side, gives a wheezing gasp, and is still. The entire episode of him coming through the door to being on the floor was, at most, four seconds.

He goes on to describe how the police were called, he and his girlfriend were taken in for questioning. Fortunately, in this situation, there was a video (I presume from a Ring door camera or similar), the stranger's family admitted that the stranger was mentally ill and had gone off his meds, and the stranger had gone down the street ringing door bells and knocking on other doors--our home defender just happened to be the first person (only person) to open the door to the guy.

    The author had a few takeaways or lessons learned:

1. Things happen really fast.
2. You really do have auditory exclusion: he notes he fired three rounds of .40 S&W inside a house but only heard a "pop". (It might not have completely been auditory exclusion as much as we have a lot things in a house--carpet, soft furniture, etc.--that absorb sound).
3. The video was extremely important to his not being charged because it showed everything, including the author holding a hand out and instructing the stranger not to come any closer.
4. He wound up having to use two hands to access his handgun (one hand holding the holstered pistol and the other to draw the handgun) and concludes that however you have your defensive handgun, you need to be able to access it with but a single hand.

I think I would also add: if a stranger is walking away from your house and something feels off about the person (as the author describes in this case), don't open the door or attempt to engage him/her. He also mentioned an issue with his choice of defensive ammo:

When I finally got the police and coroner’s reports several months later, I discovered that one HydraShock round was found in The Bad Guy’s jacket. It had not penetrated very far and simply either fell out of him or was dislodged during chest compression. It expanded slightly, but penetrated very little. I’ve read similar reports about HydraShocks and will be switching to a different defense-grade round like the Speer Gold Dots. None of the bullets exited The Bad Guy’s body. The shots were, according to the coroner’s report, in the center chest/sternum area, above the right nipple, and in the mid-abdomen right side. The toxicology report noted a not-unusual level of marijuana in The Bad Guy’s system, but nothing else.

He has more about what the police did and how he reacted after the shooting so be sure to read the whole thing.

• "Making The Best Choice For A Home Defense Gun"--Shooting Illustrated. An excerpt:

The first and most immediate factor in selecting a home defense gun is your individual skill and comfort level. If, heaven forbid, you woke tonight to an intruder breaking into your home, then grab the firearm you are most proficient with. Skill with a handgun surpasses using a more powerful carbine or shotgun if you lack competence with those particular guns. Proficiency matters more than the specific gun type in a home defense situation. If you determine a particular firearm suits your needs long-term, invest time in training and practice until you are competent and confident. Meanwhile, use the gun you can reliably score hits with, as getting good hits is what matters in any home defense scenario.

Other factors he brings up is: whether you will be barricading or moving; over-penetration; and capacity.

• "Overpressure: What Is It and Why Does It Matter?"--The Mag Life. The author notes: 

In this context, overpressure is the external pressure change that occurs as a projectile exits the muzzle. Overpressure depends on a variety of conditions including barrel length, caliber, and how confined the environment is. For most of us, this is a very important consideration that should be accounted for in your defense plan, personally or professionally. Unfortunately, few of us know what affects overpressure or why it matters.

 And:

Overpressure occurs by the expansion of gasses as a projectile exits a barrel. This is partly the source of hearing damage from a firearm discharge. Bullets that exceed the sound barrier generate a sonic crack as they exit the barrel. In addition, the expansion of gasses causes noise and a pressure change in the immediate area. Sudden changes in pressure can cause temporary or permanent hearing damage if adequate hearing protection isn’t used. Suppressors help mitigate this by slowing the expansion of gasses exiting the muzzle. As a result, the potential for hearing damage is reduced. Overpressure, especially in enclosed spaces, will cause permanent hearing damage.

Although he admits that he doesn't know enough about it to discuss it, he also noted that there has been some discussion of overpressure also causing micro-trauma to the brain. I would not be surprised given the linkage between soldiers being subject to explosive bursts and PTSD. In any event, he discusses the risk of hearing damage in more detail and ways to mitigate it, including a recommendation of using a pistol caliber carbine or using a sound suppressor. "Of further consideration, subsonic cartridges like .300 Whisper or subsonic 9mm have less overpressure than their supersonic counterparts."

• "Steel Pennies And Alternative Ammo: A Different .30-06 M2 Ball"--Shooting Sports USA. The author discusses the M2 Alternative cartridge: "To conserve copper during the earlier part of World War II, the War Department approved a plan to thin the jacket on M2 Ball bullets and place a steel clad between the lead core and the copper jacket." Also:

So far as I could definitively ascertain, the St. Louis Ordnance Plant was the only manufacturer of M2 Alternative, during 1942-1943, though other plants might also have produced it. M2 Alternative is not really a mystery cartridge when we acknowledge that the U.S. Army considered it as no different in ballistic performance than standard M2 Ball ammunition. Indeed, it was manufactured specifically to be so, and perhaps one reason to specify it as “M2 Alternative” on packaging was to be sure to differentiate it from steel core amor piercing (AP) ammunition of the day that also attracts a magnet. At the time, all lead core M2 Ball was intended as an anti-personnel round and for use against non-armored targets, such as common vehicles. As it turned out, the Army eventually made steel core AP ammunition general issue in place of lead core M2 Ball, according to TM 9-1900 of 1945.

• "We're Living in a Different World Now - Let's Talk About Situational Awareness"--The Truth About Guns. The author's main point is that "Criminals aren’t Invisible, Victims are Oblivious":

    Don’t believe me? Just take a look around the next time you drive down any public road. At every red light you’ll see people sucked into their smartphones, completely oblivious to what’s going on around them. Others walk with ear buds in, unconcerned with the myriad strangers who enter and exit their immediate personal space as they walk down the street. And others still are so preoccupied with their own thoughts and concerns, they wouldn’t notice a bomb going off right next to them.

    Inevitably when these people become victims of a smash-and-grab robbery, or get mugged in the street, they will say something like “It happened so fast! One moment and they were just there – in my face!”

    Now, criminals are many things. But they are not supernatural and do not possess the capacity to instantly teleport themselves. And even though they may move fast and act aggressively when they have selected and locked-on to their intended target, they certainly telegraph their presence and intent. Chances are that the victim would not only have observed their assailant’s presence before the attack, but would also have registered them as a potential threat. That is if they were actively scanning their environment and knew what to look for.

    That said, you cannot avoid or evade something you do not see. And you will not see a threat if you are not scanning for it. Which is where situational awareness comes in.

He also goes over a few pre-attack indicators:

• No Cover for Action, No Cover for Status: anyone who doesn’t appear to have a reason for being where they are and doing what they appear to be doing. They don’t fit the baseline of what belongs in the environment, and their presence is “off”. This is the person loitering near you in a parking lot with no car keys in their hands. They’re just standing there and looking around with their head on a swivel while touching their waistline.
• Sudden Change in Someone’s Status: the person loitering near you in the parking lot closes in on you as soon as your hands are occupied by opening your car door. Nothing else has changed. Be wary if your presence suddenly causes any person’s status to suddenly change.
• Correlation of Movement: the person is following closely behind you, and takes every turn you do. They cross the street with you. If you stop and suddenly turn around – they slow down or stutter step, and then hold off while maintaining their distance.
• Hidden Hands Causing Unnatural Movement: people swing both their hands naturally when walking normally. When someone hides their hands behind their leg, in their armpit, or under their arm – it will affect the way they move and make their movements appear unnatural. Hidden hands is a potential indicator of a hidden weapon.

This is not an exhaustive list of indicators. Predatory glancing and predatory movement (like flanking you or boxing you in) are also potential threat-indicators. What is important is that if your gut feeling tells you someone or something is wrong – you better learn to listen to it.

Of course, this generally only applies to robberies on the street. It obviously won't apply to your doing something like getting involved in the "monkey dance" or receiving an educational beat down. It also becomes more difficult to spot some of these people in crowded spaces or if they have a pre-planned ambush. What might seem obvious in a parking lot or walking down a mostly empty street is going to be harder on a crowded subway platform, busy and crowded sidewalk, or similar.