ChrisJericho

Hey guys, so I heard about how the NRA-ILA archives instances of people using firearms to defend themselves, so I checked out the page:

NRA-ILA ::

I selected WA from the drop down menu and read the stories, and also checked out the stories from Oregon as well.

I'm not someone who knows much about gun fighting statistics, but it was slightly surprising how few shots were fired in many cases. Generally once the bad guys find out their target is armed and the target fires a few shots the bad guys run away or are wounded/die. This was usually the case for altercations in public and in the home.

I had read on some random forums (because the information found on forums is always accurate and reliable) that in gun fights the average number of shots fired is around 3, and these anecdotal stories from the NRA-ILA seem to support that.

Yes this may be old news to the tactical, bear killing gurus on this board. For me though this may have some practical applications. I think I have been influenced by the belief system that you need to have "a lot of rounds" that you need 10+ rounds in a carry gun and anything less is asking for trouble, and therefore a double stack 9mm is the best choice for carry. However if the "typical" gunfight only has a few shots fired, it may be better to have a fewer amount of large caliber rounds (ie .45acp) than a high amount of smaller rounds (9mm). Of course there is no substitute for shot placement/accuracy.

This also has has made me think about carrying my extra magazine. When the weather was/is cool enough and I am wearing a jacket I do carry an extra magazine on my belt since I can easily conceal it. However the during the summer the extra magazine prints far too much and I leave it at home. I felt guilty about doing this because obviously the magazine could be useful for the additional amount of ammunition and plus it's necessary if the magazine in the gun malfunctioned or if I had a jam that required dropping it out of the well to clear the gun and inserting a new mag.

But given how few shots are fired, an additional 13 rounds of 9mm probably will never be used and in case of a jam the altercation will likely be so short there wouldn't be enough time to clear the gun and put a new mag in. The criminals would probably have already run away (since I assume at least the first round in the chamber went off) or I would be dead. Yes I will still likely carry an extra mag when it's cold out, but I will feel less guilty about not carrying one during our two months of summer here in the Northwest.

*Caveats
- I'm sure the NRA-ILA does not put on their website instances where people failed to legally protect themselves with firearms and were killed by bad guys. Obviously this would not help their agenda. So of course the stories from their website need to be taken with a grain of salt.

- Most of the bad guys in these stories are burglars/street thugs who are generally just after stuff to steal or quick cash, i.e. their motivation level is low. I think one instance where having a lot of ammo would be very advantageous is in the case of the mentally ill like the virginia tech shooter who have already decided ahead of time their goal is to kill. These types of bad guys would probably be more likely to engage any type of resistance instead of running. Of course no one can "pick" which type of threat will arise but the burglar/street thug is more common than the bloodthirsty gunman.

Anyway, these are just my random musings. I'm sure they are filled with gross inconsistencies and a false portrayal of what happens out there in the 'real world.'

Please enlighten me.

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"A casual stroll through the lunatic asylum shows us that faith proves nothing." - Friedrich Nietzsche

Walt

Why be average when you can be extraordinary? A wise man once told me "Anyone worth shooting once is worth shooting a dozen times." In a gunfight you don't shoot twice, check your fire, and see if the bad guy decides to call it a day. You gun that fucker down. People often eat multiple rifle rounds and keep on fighting. A handgun doesn't bring near as much ass as a rifle so I would say that 5 rounds from a handgun should be the minimum fired in a self-defense situation.

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IMO, a lot of this 3-shot nonsense is a result of people getting complacent with their training. Everyone practices the double-tap and the two-in-the-chest-one-in-the-head drills. They shoot their 2-3 rounds, pause and start over. That "starting over" pause often unconsciously carries over in to real world situations. Instead of shooting until the bad guy ceases to be a threat, the shooter fires 2-3 rounds and then forfeits the initiative, allowing the bad guy a split second to recover.

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Calmer than you are...

Plan9

Extraordinary. Hah.

...

I'm not going to get into the NRA's statistical circle jerk because asking the NRA how guns are used for self defense is like asking a '90s Ford Explorer what stability is. I assume you get the same asswipe monthly 60 page block advertisement for the Taurus Judge and Springfield XD that I do. Their stories about little old ladies blasting racial minorities is hilarious because you know damn well it didn't go down quite like how they put it.

So... how hot does it get in Washington state?

I mean, I live much farther south than you. A place where my balls are laminated to one of my thighs from May until September.

First: If you're carrying a gun, you should be carrying a reload. Please don't tell me something the size of your pocket knife is "printing" or it's inconvenient to have on your belt while you're also carrying a gun that occupies four times the amount of space and weighs four times as much. Put it in your front pants pocket, cut the bottom out of that useless 5th pocket on your jeans and stick it in there with the bullets facing right or just realize that most people have no clue what a pistol magazine looks like and will assume that little black thing on your belt is the newest Motorola StarTac.

Walt is absolutely correct on complacency. You don't poke a guy twice with a handgun at such close range and consider it sure thing. It ain't. This is concealed carry: you're most likely alone (in arms), surprised, not wearing armor and have to react to somebody whose breath you can smell. Fire for effect and the effect you want is a the dude sprawled on the ground. The surprise aspect and inherently short engagement distance means you're already playing catchup with every single action that you do and the fact that you'll be pumped up like Mr. Jitterpaws and may not even hit anything vital with your first three rounds. Danny Dirtbag can still squeeze the trigger on his Hi-Point if you only double tap him in the stomach. Just look at how many times law enforcement officers have had to Tupac Shakur somebody (17+1) just to put them down. I'll leave advancing fire out of this discussion.

At short range, you're not running away, you're not taking cover, you're not doing anything except drawing, pushing out, and dumping as many rounds into the target as it takes to put it on the ground. My general rule of thumb when I train is that if I'm shooting at anything less than 10 yards I'm firing center mass with at least six rounds. That means that if something were to happen in real life that I'll probably just empty the magazine into somebody and have the gun back up in my workspace before the dramatic music starts playing. This is assuming I don't get killed first. I'm not a bad shot (versus Dick Cheney) but it's common sense: if a dirtbag already has his weapon out I have a severe disadvantage as I react starting with my dickbeaters holding a bag of groceries (most likely full of boxes of delicious breakfast cereal which I will be very reluctant to drop in order to index my weapon).

If you attend a decent (perfect nebulous term) defensive pistol class you'll do drills where you do point shooting with strings of five or more shots. Sometimes they'll have you dump a whole magazine as fast as you safely can after doing fifty jumping jacks and spinning around a few times.

This is why when I carry the .38 Special J-frame I realize that I have little margin for error. 5 shots on a revolver go fast and a reload, even with the speedloaders in my pocket, would seem to take a decade once the last round is off. The Glock 19, however, offers me more than enough firepower between the two magazines to stop two or three attackers given that such a method is common in urban areas. You can never have enough ammo in a situation like that but you carry what makes sense. Having a gun and no extra mag doesn't make sense and you know it. Your OP stated the reasons.

Keep in mind that I'm completely clueless on concealed carry and that I haven't killed anyone, including babies, so I'm far from a subject matter expert.

Edit:

You have to adjust your clothing for concealed carry. I think it was even recently discussed at this board. If you wear size 32 jeans and have a IWB, you buy size 34 so it'll fit comfortably. If you wear these trendy fitted t-shirts in a medium, you have to get a large that'll hang wider under your arms so you don't develop that tell tale gun-shaped tumor that 10% of the population will see. Sometimes you have to wear an undershirt and an overshirt. Button-up shirts work great left open. Vests work in the winter (I have a mild vest fetish but I keep it under wraps). Abercrombie and Fitch models don't CCW. Baggy clothes work because they literally give wiggle room to perform normal tasks without stretching cloth over your piece.

If all else fails you could wear the concealed carry shirt. It isn't the preferred method. They're far from fast but it's better than no gun and you have zero excuse not to stick a reload in the other side. I wear this one for activities where having a gun on my belt would be an issue. Like speed dating.

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Whatever you can carry.

"You should not drink... and bake."