Considerations for Concealed Carry In Cold Weather

Massad Ayoob's 2010 article, "Cold weather shooting considerations" offers some advice for carrying and using firearms in the winter. Although he covers the topic both for someone carrying a defensive handgun and hunters, I want to concentrate on items particularly relevant to someone carrying concealed.

    Obviously the impact on hands and handwear is a major consideration even for someone carrying concealed. As Ayoob points out, "Cold hands get numb, and numb hands get clumsy. Gloved hands can be warm, but warm gloves are thick enough to reduce the sense of feel and make gun-handling clumsy…a potentially dangerous thing." He adds:

As to gloves, you want the one on the hand that works the trigger to come off quickly, smoothly, and silently when you need to shoot. I tried the old woodsman’s trick of a thin, lengthwise knife slit on the trigger finger portion of the glove to let the warm index finger sneak out when it needed to work the trigger. Imperfect. Snow got into the glove and froze the finger as soon as you had to grab a snowy branch or catch yourself in a fall in the snow. Also, the palmar surface of the glove wants something rubbery for traction.

I've found that the lightweight polyester athletic gloves are thin enough for weapon manipulations while protecting the hand, to a certain extent, from the cold. Most today offer some grippy material on the palms that aids with traction. For me, these are generally sufficient for walking from a car to a building (or vice versa) and clearing windows. The weather in your area may differ. So an alternative offered up in the article is to wear the thin gloves inside a heavier (and looser) pair of gloves or mittens, with the idea that you could whip off the heavier gloves when you are getting ready to shoot.

    Some other considerations that Ayoob brings up:

• I learned that a heavier trigger pull was a good thing to prevent premature discharge when working with cold-numbed or gloved trigger finger. ...
  
• As a handgun hunter in my teens, I learned from my predecessors to carry the gun under my coat, protected from the elements. With a long coat, a cross-draw holster let me reach it quick, but I found a shoulder holster worked best of all: if I fastened the outer coat up to just below the pectoral muscles, the upper part of the coat would stay closed to keep out cold and wind, but the hand could knife right in to gain immediate access. The coat-protected shoulder holster also gave the best protection to the handgun if you fell face-first in deep snow. I learned from experience that gloves would block the trigger return of double action revolvers. ...

Based on my own experience shooting in extremely cold weather, I have found that carrying a handgun (particularly a semi-auto) inside your jacket does wonders for keeping it warm and able to function when you draw it from inside the coat to fire. 

    Other advice has to do with lubrication (use synthetic lubricants that will work well in colder weather), protecting the muzzle and sights from snow and ice, improving your purchase on a stock or pistol grip, other ideas as to handwear, cleaning the firearm when you return from the outdoors, etc.

    An earlier article from Mr. Ayoob, dating from 2003 goes into even more detail as far as handguns go. That article, similarly entitled "Firearms and cold weather considerations" begins with some considerations for protecting your hands before moving onto long arms. But Ayoob then addresses handguns. A few points:

• On concealment: "The good news about cold weather garb is that it discreetly hides larger handguns. The bad news is that the thick, heavy padding of Arctic clothing can restrict your mobility and range of movement in terms of reaching for a location like a shoulder holster hanging beneath the opposite side armpit. You also have to worry about getting the reaching hand through the fastened clothing to the gun underneath."
• Night sights: "I have night sights on most of my carry guns now. What does that have to do with winter gun-handling? Only that in the winter there’s a helluva lot more dark than in the summer, and a 'shot in the dark' is proportionally more likely to be required."
• He recommends a secure holster, even if the weapon is secured by a strap, because of the heightened risk of slipping and falling in snow and ice. On this point, he adds: "I noticed an interesting thing with Alaskan cops. The great majority carried their service handguns in high-security holsters, for just the reason cited above as well as the danger of a suspect snatching at their exposed duty weapon. However, the great majority of these officers also carry their spare magazines in open top, friction tight pouches. The reason: cold, gloved hands can retrieve the magazines faster without fumbling for a pouch flap. Besides, with the pouch generally underneath the winter coat, the magazines are protected from inclement weather and in any case, no perpetrator would try to snatch the spare ammo instead of the gun."
  
• He discusses the issues with wearing gloves: that you need a weapon with an enlarged trigger guard (more common today than at the time he wrote his article) and suggests avoiding firearms that could discharge simply from a gloved finger being pushed inside the trigger guard (using single action weapons like the 1911 as an example). He suggests, instead, using a double-action weapon (a DA revolver or DAO semi-auto) for the safety offered by the heavy trigger or a Glock because of the larger trigger guard.
  

Ayoob also addresses ammunition. Not just because powder may not burn as well, leading to slower burn rates and less pressure, but also issues with bullet expansion into a target that might be wearing heavy clothing. 

Hollowpoint handgun bullets tend to plug with wool, Fiberfill, and whatnot as they pass through the heavy winter clothing of a criminal assailant. When plugged with inert matter, they usually won’t expand. This fact makes larger caliber bullets popular in cold climes. The two times I had to pick a single standard-issue sidearm for Northern New England police departments we wound up with traditional double action .45 caliber semiautomatics. If the bullets were going to turn into non-expanding ball projectiles, we wanted them to turn into big non-expanding projectiles. ...

There is more there--as noted, I completely skipped the section on rifles--so be sure to read the whole thing.

More:

• "Cold Weather Shooting: Preparing Your Firearms for Winter"--American Conceal & Carry. Offering advice on preparing a weapon for winter shooting, ammunition issues in cold weather, tips for shooting, selecting appropriate clothing, and more.
• "Winter Weapons Handling"--Risk Management Magazine (U.S. Army). Mostly tips on protecting and cleaning weapons when using them in cold weather.