HAS YOUR HANDGUN TRAINING SET YOU UP TO BE KILLED?

If you have a handgun for self defense, you probably bought it with the thought in mind that you would be able to use it to save your life or the life of a loved one, in a close quarters life threat situation.

And you, like millions of others, probably have been trained in traditional Sight Shooting for use in such a situation.

Well, if you think you will be able to use your handgun and that training in a real self defense situation, you could be dead wrong.

SIGHT SHOOTING FAILS IN CLOSE QUARTERS SELF DEFENSE SITUATIONS:

Sight Shooting is not or cannot be employed in most all life and death close quarters situations, and it is those situations where the possibility of being shot and/or killed is the highest. If you are going to be shot and killed, there is an 80% chance that will happen at less than 20 feet.

Darrell Mulroy, a LE trainer and an owner of Plus P Technology Inc. in Minneapolis, MN, stated that he made a review of 900+ videos of real shootings, and found that Sight Shooting was not used in any of them. Here is what he said about Sight Shooting: "You still ASSUME you will look at the gun in a real shooting. Wish we could find it on REAL videos of such things. We are still looking 900+ videos later." Darrell passed away in 2003.

I know of no pics, films, or videos of Sight Shooting ever being used effectively in a real life and death CQ self defense situations; yet it has been taught for use in those situations for over 100 years so there should be thousands of them.

Back in 1969, the Firearms and Tactics Section of the New York City Police Department instituted a procedure for the in-depth documentation and study of police combat situations. It was designated Department Order SOP 9.

Data gathering began in January 1970, and over 6000 cases were studied during the 1970s. The study results and findings were released in 1981. (Click here for more information on the SOP 9.) The study findings have not been refuted to date.

As to shooting distances:

The shooting distances where officers survived, remained almost the same during the SOP years (1970-1979), and for a random sampling of cases going back as far as 1929. 4,000 cases were reviewed. The shooting distance in 75% of those cases was less than 20 feet.

Contact to 10 feet ... 51%
10 feet to 20 feet .... 24%

As to sight alignment:

In 70% of the cases reviewed, sight alignment was not used. Officers reported that they used instinctive or point shooting.

As the distance between the officer and his opponent increased, some type of aiming was reported in 20% of the cases. This aiming or sighting ran from using the barrel as an aiming reference to picking up the front sight and utilizing fine sight alignment.

The remaining 10% could not remember whether they had aimed or pointed and fired the weapon instinctively.

Also, with few exceptions, Officers fired with the strong hand.

FIGHT OR FLIGHT:

There is a growing body of scientific knowledge that deals with close quarters life and death situations and what happens in them. It provides scientific reasons as to why Sight Shooting is just not practical for use in close quarters.

Scientific research has shown that when a person perceives that they are in life threat situation, what is called the Fight or Flight response or Body Alarm Response, is activated.

It is the survival mechanism that allows mammals to focus their available resources to meet or flee a threat. Its activation is automatic, supersedes all voluntary and involuntary systems, and is virtually uncontrollable.

When activated, it immediately dumps stress hormones into the blood stream to "supercharge" the body for responding to the threat.

It enhances some abilities and limits or turns off others, so that only those that are the most critical to fighting or fleeing are maintained.

There will be: an immediate increase in the heart rate and blood flow to large muscle masses (resulting in enhanced gross motor skills and strength capabilities), constriction of minor blood vessels at the end of the appendages, decreased blood flow to the periphery of the retina, pupil dilation, muscle tremors, and cessation of the digestive process.

With the decrease in blood flow to the periphery of the retina, peripheral vision will collapse with a reduction of up to 70% in the visual field according to the literature (tunnel vision).

Adrenaline will be released into the blood stream and it will cause the ciliary muscle of the eye to relax. The result will be to change the eye lens from a convex shape to a flattened state for enhanced far vision for focusing on the threat, and with the accompanying loss of near vision that is needed for focusing on close objects such as the sights of a handgun.


Also, the practice of closing one eye to assist in shooting (monocular vision), will become moot, as both eyes will be open (binocular vision).

If you know what things can or will occur, you can prepare for them, but you will not be able to prevent them from happening.

With the heart rate increase, fine motor skills that are needed for Sight Shooting will improve until the heart rate reaches about 110 BPM, then they will rapidly deteriorate and be lost to use when the heart rate reaches about 130 BPM.

And in a real close quarters life and death situation, the heart rate will at a minimum, jump to over 145 BPM, so fine motor skills that are needed for Sight Shooting will be lost to use.

Here are some other effects of the Fight or Flight response that you can expect in a real life and death threat situation.

Your hearing will be limited and you will not be able to hear gunfire noise, warnings, or vocal directions.

You will lose your depth perception.

Your night vision will be lost.

You will not feel scratches, cuts, or even bullet wounds.

You may not bleed.

Your thinking processes will slow down due to the loss of vision and sensory inputs that are needed to make decisions and come up with responses.

Bruce K. Siddle, in his book Sharpening the Warrior's Edge, says "Motor skills that use large muscle mass (gross motor skills and are cognitively simple (require very little decision making), produce optimal performance during high levels of stress."

He also references a study by Weinberg and Hunt (1973), in which they found that "motor skills dominated by large muscle groups which have minimal fine motor control and very little decision making or cognitive complexity, were not affected by high levels of stress."

Also, only gross motor skills, like those used to perform the Isosceles shooting stance which requires the use of muscle groups working together in simple symmetrical movements, or for making a straight punch, will continue to improve with increased levels of stress, even if the heart rate accelerates to 220 BPM.

Complex motor skills on the other hand, like those used for the Weaver stance and which require the use of different muscle groups working asymmetrically, will deteriorate once the heart rate reaches about 145 BPM, and they will be lost to use when it reaches about 175 BPM.

A good portion of the chapter of Mr. Siddle's book dealing with Survival Motor Skill classification, focuses on which is the better shooting stance to use in a survival situation, the Weaver, which is achieved mainly through the use of complex motor skills, or the Isosceles, which is achieved mainly through the use of gross motor skills. The discussion does not address at length, the fine motor skill hand-eye-coordination which is needed to sight shoot a firearm.

However, in the summary of that chapter, there is a statement which has great impact here.

"Since it is reasonable to expect any survival situation to increase the student's heart rate beyond 145 beats per minute, all survival training should be based on gross motor skills whenever possible."

When I read that statement, that little light bulb of understanding flashed on, and I understood why Sight Shooting training "goes out the window" in close quarters shootouts, and why all you get is point and blast shooting with its miss rate of about 80%.

Since, the ability to use fine motor skills zeros out at about 130 BPM, and since the heart rate is expected at a minimum, to go over 145 BPM in those situations, it is no wonder why Sight Shooting doesn't make it into videos of close quarters survival shootings.

Sight Shooting is just not applicable for use in real close quarters life or death self defense situations.

I am sure there are exceptions, but they would be few and far between.

It has value in extended range situations, or for proactive use by a skilled operator in some settings, but not for most all life or death close quarters self defense shooting situations.

As to the Isosceles stance, it may be able to be used when the heart rate is very high, but in close quarters situations as was established in the NYPD study, with few exceptions Officers fired with the strong hand.

Most all pictures on the web of people holding guns, show them using a two handed grip. That of course does not square with reality if one has a gun for self defense use.

Those pics could lead them to practice a shooting method which will fail, and mostly likely with adverse results, in a situation where their life is on the line.

AIMED POINT SHOOTING WORKS:

AIMED Point Shooting or P&S, requires minimal fine motor skill and very little decision making or cognitive complexity, as pointing the index finger is instinctive and automatic.

P&S does require that one pull the trigger, but trigger pulling happens in all the videos I am aware of.

P&S is a "no brainer," and that is just what is called for in such situations.

It is simple, instinctive and automatic. It is not complex and cognitive.

Under stress, it will leave whatever brain power you have that is still functioning, free to make decisions and direct your action/s to save your life or the lives of others.

Here is another statement from the summary of the chapter mentioned above in Mr. Siddle's book:

"In essence, the ideal survival skill should be kept as simple as possible in technique complexity, technique response time, and theory of application."

With P&S, you grab the gun, point your index finger at the threat, and pull the trigger if needed. No more, no less.

Below are more statements that expand on the information above. They also answer the question of why the shooting accuracy achieved with Sight Shooting during qualifying shoots, can not be expected to be repeated in real life and death survival stress conditions.

"...there are many conditions of survival stress that can not be duplicated outside the real threat. Therefore, we cannot correctly assume that techniques which are successful in training, will also be effective in the field." (Page 40.)

"Countless studies have found that to maintain optimal performance conditions for fine motor skills, the conditions should maintain at low or non existent stress levels." (Page43.)

"Closed motor skills are skills conducted in a static, non-stressful environment...An example would include a firearms qualification in which the student performs the firing sequences on command at targets that are consistently the same and do not shoot back." (Page 45.)

"...since it is reasonable to believe a student's heart rate will exceed 145 BPM when exposed to a life threatening stimulus, the training of fine and complex motor skills should be avoided as much as possible. (Page 97.)

Bruce K. Siddle's book Sharpening the Warrior's Edge: The Psychology and Science of Training, (1995) is an excellent source of information on the Fight or Flight response. It is well written, and it is both scholarly and easy to understand. It is distributed by PPCT Research Publications, PPCT Management Systems, Inc., Millstadt, IL 62260.

OTHER SOURCES OF INFORMATION:

Other papers that explain why Sight Shooting fails in real life and death close quarters situations are available. Use the link below to access some of them. The papers discuss training, and means and methods to effectively deal with real close quarters life and death situations.

Use this link to access those papers.

On a lighter note, but still a serious one, believing that Sight Shooting can be used in real close quarters shootings, is sort of like believing in flying saucers.

There are good and honest folks who believe in flying saucers, and some have even said they have taken rides in them.

Now, I don't doubt their honesty and sincerity a bit, but it would be nice to see a video or two of some flying saucers coming over low and slow.

There also are good and honest folks who believe that Sight Shooting can be used in real close quarters shootings.

Some say they have used it themselves, or they say that they have seen it used. I don't doubt their honesty and sincerity either, but it would be nice to see a few or some videos of Sight Shooting being used.

I have seen many shooting videos. In them, the shooters do not aim. They just point their guns towards a target and blast away. Sight Shooting training, if they had any, goes out the window, and what you get is Point and Blast shooting and a miss rate of around 80 percent.

As with Darrell Mulroy, in a review of 900+ shooting videos, you would expect to find a few cases of gun operator error, that is, where Sight Shooting was not used. But when there are 900+ cases of gun operator error in 900+ videos, something is seriously amiss.

REFERENCE MATERIALS:

Finally, here is a list of a variety of source materials that I compiled from four papers dealing with the subject material.

1. Antal, Laslo and Skanaker, Ragnar (1985), Pistol Shooting, Antal & Skanaker.

2. Applegate, Colonel Rex (1943), Kill or Get Killed, Paladin Press.

3. Applegate, Colonel Rex and Janich, Michael D (1998), Bullseyes Don't Shoot Back, Paladin Press.

4. Ashton, Doug and Quinlin, J. (1998), Dynamic Firearms Training Research, Peel Regional Police.

5. Barron, Steve (1996). Old Training Methods Become New Again, Law & Order Magazine, September, 1997

6. Burroughs, W. (1997). Police and Security News, November/December Issue

7. Burroughs, William (1998), Dynamic Encounter Training: An Analysis of Contemporary Firearms Training Methods and Their Task Suitability for High Stress Combat Scenarios, TALON Training & Development, Inc.

8. Cassidy, William L. (1978), Quick or Dead, Paladin Press.

9. Cratty, B. J. (1978). Movement Behavior and Motor Learning

10. Fairbairn, W.E. and Sykes, E.A. (1942), Shooting To Live, Paladin Press.

11. Fairley, J. (1978). Remember Amhen, Aldershot

12. Grossman, D. (1995, 1996). On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society. Little, Brown, and Co, New York.

13. Grossman, D. & Siddle, B. (1997) Critical Incident Amnesia, PPCT Research Publications

14. Guyton, A., M.D. (1976). Textbook of Medical Physiology, 5th Edition, Saunders Publishing

15. Holmes, R. (1985)/ Acts of War; The Behavior of Men in Battle. The Free Press, New York.

16. Hontz, T. (1997). Firearms Response Time Study, PPCT Research Publications

17. Marshal, S.L.A. (1950). The Soldiers Load and the Mobility of a Nation, The Marine Corps Association

18. Schmidt, Richard (1975), Motor Skills, Human Kinetics.

19. Siddle, Bruce (1995). Sharpening the Warrior's Edge, PPCT Research Publications

20. Siddle, Bruce (1998), Scientific and Test Data Validating the Isosceles and Single-Hand Point Shooting Techniques, PPCT Research Review.

21. Suarez, Gabriel (1996), The Evolutions of Reactive Shooting, The Tactical Edge (Fall 1996).

22. Weinberg, R. Ph.D. (1989). *Cited in An Examination of Stress Shooting Stances, PPC71' Research Publications

23. Weomberg, R., Ph.D. (1989). Cited in An Examination of Stress Shooting Stances, PPCT Research Publications

24. Westmoreland, H. (1989). An Examination of Stress Shooting Stances, PPCT Research Publications

25. Vila, B. and Morrison, G. (1994), Biological Limits of Police Combat Handgun Shooting Accuracy, American Journal of Police, Volume 13, No. 1.

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