Moving with a gun

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DragonRider

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Most schools I have been at for shooting concentrate on shooting and moving in an open environment. But, I was thinking a few days ago, how would I move in an environment with halls/corridors/shopping aisles/doors in both evac and engagement scenarios?

IDPA tries to replicate a bit of this, but doesnt reach it, but unless your a LEO or in the military, we are winging it to a bit. Any schools that have a slant on the above paragraph??

Just a thought on something I need in the toolbox.

John
 
You need a "shoot house" course.

I did mine with Simunitions.

It'll scare the beegezus out of you.

I ended up being an assistant instructor (read BG) and got shot at a lot and missed more than a lot and the one thing it taught me was that unless you have to go into a house to save a loved one...don't.
 
Hso has it. It's a really, really risky thing to do, even for a trained tac team. Unless you absolutely have to do it (e.g. to rescue your child, or something like that), pull back and wait for the cops.

Like hso, I've done this training with "play guns", and it's a real eye-opener.
 
Presuming you're either trying to escape, or secure loved ones....because otherwise, leaving the tactical stuff is best left to the 'professionals'....
Just like moving in the open, you move from cover to cover. Stay put only long enough to scan ahead for your next cover, and to asses for threats. Move quickly, heads up, and not in a straight line. Watch for fatal funnels (doorways, stairwells, balconies). Make sure to clear all corners ("slice the pie"), and watch for BG's using cover as well.
Moving 'dynamically' is an option. You're not quite running, but a fast walk. Your primary hope in this scenerio is to use surprise and overwhelming force/firepower to subdue your enemy.
 
Don't get me wrong, I entirely plan on leaving stuff to professionals and such. Its just something that isn't nearly practiced enough. And trying to think of ways to make it second nature. Pulling back is what I plan in most situations, but, last monday I was really thinking on how to move to get to my wife who is about 50-80 meters from me through corridors. At the time we had the situation in Fairfax going on and it just made me think where I was lacking. See what I can do with simuntions/playing badguy.

Trying to see if any school has a course that concentrates on that.

John
 
I believe Thunder Ranch used to have a course geared towards a husband and wife team that covered some of what you are looking for.

You won't find a reputable school that will give a civilian any more then that. There won't be any discussion of specific SOPs and TTPs here on THR either.

Very few professionals get enough training on this. There are a few military units and a few full time police tactical units that actually train enough to be really good at this. It's very time and resource intensive to do it right.

The minimum standard for police departments seems to be a five day basic course for officers newly assigned to a tactical team and then a minimum of 16 hours per month of sustainment training. This is the bare minimum to have any kind of proficiency. Most people will agree that it's totally inadequate, but too often it's driven by budget and not realistic standards.

Don't expect to go to a two day class (if you can find one) and come out knowing enough to be proficient.

You've already been given the best advice. Don't ever go into a building under those circumstances.

Jeff
 
D.R.

We manage to do alright with our limited resources. We have two shoothouses that stay up on the property year round. You're not too far away, in northern VA. We have a few folks who work at the five sided building who think highly enough of us to come up to train with us at our monthly study group from when they are in country.

Come by and see us after our annual conference event is over, and we get back to normal. Every 3rd Saturday . . .

www.teddytactical.com

Everyone wants to leave house clearing up to the professionals. Its acceptable to me unless its someone I care about in the dwelling. If my family were someplace that had bad men in it killing folks, you'd have to expend a LOT of resources to keep me out.

I recall unarmed mothers being restrained by policemen in Columbine. They sure seemed a lot better at doing that rapidly than entering buildings. Think about who you are handing the task over to, and how motivated they are to accomplish it, before you relinquish it.


Personally, I'll take my chances.
 
Entering Structures

As pretty much everyone has already said, if you don't absolutely have to enter a structure for an emergency type rescue,...don't. Even well trained teams encounter many problems when trying to employ a tactical response into an unknown environment.

Even if you have a partner, you are relying on a person who may not "have a clue" about building search tactic's. Prior to the Columbine incident, the vast majority of police officers were clueless about entry and rescue tactic's. They did what they were usually trained to do prior to that incident, which was to secure the perimeter and call for the "Tac-Team".

We have since realized that this is not always the best type of response, especially in a "Homicide In Progress" scenario where lives are being lost. Many, if not most agencies have since recognized the need for the "First Responders", (Patrol Officer's), to be trained so that they can be more "pro-active" in stopping the threat.

Still, this is a huge challenge in trying to train "ALL" first responders to act like "Tactically Trained" SWAT Team members. If you have ever worked in Law Enforcement, then you know that not every police officer is "cut out" to be a "Tac-Team" member. I am one of those officer's who would be inclined to make the entry and risk going in to save lives, however many are not so disposed (right or wrong).

Its one of those situations where if you go in and things work out well, your a Hero. If you make that decision and things go bad, you are crucified by the media and your own administration. If you are a civilian and are going to make that type of decision, you are entering into a "Very" dangerous and unpredictable situation.

I know that when it involves "loved Ones" or even strangers, its difficult not to want to help, but if you don't have the training and skills, you might just be adding to the problem. All one can realistically suggest is that you train and shoot in as many different types of situations and scenario's as possible. As Jeff stated, not many civilians are going to get the type of training needed to survive in these types of scenario's, much less enough "on-going" training to maintain the skills.

Good Luck
 
Shoot houses and training

Like mentioned above, a shoot house will open your eyes to what is and isn't a good idea when moving through a structure. It's amazing how many ways there are to get shot when not paying atention to corners and walls. Don't even get me started on stairs, there isn't a good way to do them.

I attended TDI earlier this year and was trained in some of the basics, but like Jeff White said, it is a very perishable skill and constant training is needed to be really proficient.
 
We do stuff like this with paintball. After about the 25th time 5 man search team gets taken out by single, perfectly clean person hiding in a structure, you start to get pucker factor at the very thought. The word 'suicide' comes to mind. Unless you have extensive training, overwhelming numbers, surprise, and flashbangs, and preferably night vision.
 
This ties into something I've asked about before and received absolutely no feedback on from any of the shooting school and professional types.

What do you do when the police aren't going to come?

All the advice we get is along the lines of "Find a defensible position. Pull back to it. Wait for the police to arrive. Shoot anything that doesn't have a badge if it approaches your position." Great. Wonderful.

What do you do if you're in New Orleans post-Katrina? If you let them get to the "safe" room you're dead. The police aren't going to come except to steal your guns and throw you out of the house to die.

For Fewments Hit the Windmill situations you have to change SOP. Nobody wants to talk about it.

It's a lot like the classic Russian strategy of "Pull back and wait for winter." It works fine if you defending Holy Mother Russia from the Germans or French. It's not so good when you teach it to the Egyptians as a way of dealing with the Israelis :D

How do you establish a perimeter around your house? Where do you establish it? How do you organized friends and neighbors for mutual support and protection? How does your doctrine change an hour after the emergency? A day? A week?
 
A few reasons why professionals won't talk about specific TTPs and SOPs

tellner,
More then half of the states have laws prohibiting paramilitary training. Most of these laws were written from a model law created by the Southern Poverty Law Center and are so vague that paintball and airsoft activities could be construed as violating them.

The Patriot Act has provisions for the prosecution of anyone providing assistance, to include training to terrorists or terrorist groups.

OPSEC - Operational Security, if you know specific tactics, techniques and procedures on how to conduct those activities, you will be able to develop your own TTPs in how to counter them.

Liability - Every school I am aware of that conducts open enrollment classes requires civilians to be vetted before they attend the training. This is a step that is taken to protect the school. It wouldn't be very good press to have it become public knowledge that you trained the last group of HEAT wannabes to take down banks and armored cars.

The antis would love to shut down Gunsite, Thunder Ranch, EAG, Trident and every other school that conducts open enrollment courses.

There are places you can go to find the answers to the questions you ask. You'll have to do the research yourself. You won't find those answers here at THR.

Jeff
 
Point taken. I disagree with it, but accept the reasoning. Frankly, with all the "SHTF" threads it's a little late to say "We won't talk about anything except the most innocuous non-controversial topics." There are plenty of discussions about long-term survivalism (usually the dumb "head for the hills with my guns and beef jerky" variety) and stupid criminal things like rising up seditiously against the government.

I'm looking at something a little milder and more realistic. When should you switch from "pull back and wait to be rescued" to other things in the medium term - hours to weeks? What are the concerns and contingencies you will have to deal with? Paramilitary training? Nope. Backup plans for getting by when things are bad and knowing that friends are better than being alone? Yep. Entering other people's houses and shooting them? Not in a million years. Keeping my house safe when a "safe room" isn't. Definitely.
 
We talk about controversial subjects here all the time. But we won't talk about how to organize your friends and neighbors into a cohesive force. We won't talk about how to establish a perimeter around your house. That is paramilitary training. There are places where you can go for that information. THR isn't and won't be one of them.

You might try the Reimer Digital Library, Paladin Press and searching Amazon.com for texts on the subjects you are interested in. You might try some of the militia websites. The ones I've seen don't provide much information like you are seeking and the quality of the tactical information posted was very poor. But I have not looked at them all. You may even find some professionals who would be willing to talk to you about these things. But if you do find one who'll talk to just anyone about this, you might want want to really check out his credentials. You might be talking to a cook, clerk or a mechanic who supported a unit that actually did those things. There are a lot of posers out there. The last option is to gain the knowledge you seek the old fashioned way. Enlist in the Infantry or join a police department and work your way up to a position on a tactical unit. Spend some time sweating and bleeding for it. Unless you're one of those exceptional people who can absorb that kind of knowledge in the classroom (and there are a very few who can), that's the only way to learn those things. I mean no disrespect when I say that. Thre are some things that you can only become proficient at with hard work, a lot of sweat, and a little blood. Take your problem of establishing a perimeter around your home. I could tell you all kinds of things about it, so could other members here, you could memorize FM 7-8 and all the Infantry school Special Texts on the subject, but until you had the experience to be able to read the terrain and apply the capabilities of your weapons to that terrain, it would be a fruitless exercise. These just aren't the kinds of subjects that you can learn on an internet forum.

Jeff
 
If I may add to Jeffs defense it isn't secret ninja stuff. Mostly comes down to common sence, predictable team work, and being aware, very aware. Jeff is right the rest is OTJT. I entered many buildings. We always sat down afterwards and develped better ways to have preformed the search or arrest. Each one sometimes unique to that environment.
Jim
 
as far as police related traiing goes that is pretty much your only option

i just completed a week of tactical entries training not too long ago and i dont feel the least bit comfortable doing one

and it all comes down to team work

if you dont know what the other guys are thinking then you are screwed

5 guys from 5 different swat teams cant enter a building worth a damn
teamwork and knowing your cohorts is the best thing going for a swat team

thats why they need to train so much
the basics remain the same but developing that trust and companionship is the most important aspect of it all

that being said, entering an occupied building by yourself without any sensory deprevation devices is pure suicide
 
5 guys from 5 different swat teams cant enter a building worth a damn
teamwork and knowing your cohorts is the best thing going for a swat team
Click to expand...

paternoster2012: You just said a mouthful there! I've been to active shooter training now twice. All I gotta say is that dynamic entry with an ad hoc team is a tactic of last resort, to be used only when people are dying. The things I saw in training bear this out painfully.

I attended FBI SWAT refresher training while a member of the EST at Warren AFB, WY in 1986. We had Laramie CSO and Cheyenne PD teams in class with us, and their training and doctrine were radically different from each other's and from ours. If you had mixed us together randomly, it would have taken a couple weeks of intensive training at a minimum to get used to each other. That's with all experienced, trained personnel. Imagine trying to do that with someone else of unknown ability and qualifications. Not this kid, unless there's no other choice.

On another note, those of you who advocate going in anyway (can't say that I blame you) should be very careful that another 'good guy' isn't already doing the same thing. It's hard enough to avoid fratricide with multiple teams when everybody's in uniform. How will the good guys know each other? One among many of your tactical considerations...
 
+1 to the teamwork posts above.

Also, in general, it takes MANY men to cover the rooms you have cleared so as to not wind up getting shot in the back (BGs know the place and can/do move). I've trained many dozens of times in a variety of "combat towns" ov the 10 year period I spent in the Marines (03 & 58 MOSs) and my blut assessment is that entering someone elses structure, when they know you are coming, is one of the most intense, confusing, and unforgiving places things you can get yourself into. It can be done, but often a great cost to the entry team - esp. if the defenders are well-equipped and prepared.


BTW, FWIW, there is no feeling quite like the first time you are "killed" in a realistic simunitions exercise. You realize you are dead. You will not go home...all because some guy you didn't see shot you through a wall, floorboard, or from some dark corner you couldn't see until it was too lat for you. Sure you're team tagged him right away after he got you...but he got you. It's not fair and you did nothing wrong...but you got killed anyway. For me, my first was sobering & I remember it very well to this day.

Anyway, it can be done. It's dangerous as all hell and requires (ideally) an efficient team that can only be honed with regular practice (teamwork skills decay rapidly). These things are really a bitch....but you can bet that I would go in alone if my loved ones were in somewhere. I'm not going to say how since it would depend on a lot of situation variables...but "you only live once"....right?
 
Storm Mountain Training Center in WV used to offer a Team Tactics class. Now they have one called 'SWAT' that looks pretty much like the same thing. The school is about a three hour drive from Dulles Airport.

I've taken Handgun II and III, Long Range Rifle 1, CPEC, and High Risk Personnel from them.
 
something I read before kinda jumps to mind with this thread "stick to the basics and you'll never have to go back to them". In answer to the posted question stick to the basics of home protection, they work in even the worse of situations. Lighting, landscaping, loud and alert dog, plan of egress, first aid and minimal fire fighting training will all go along ways to keep you standing untill the cavalry can get to you. Keep a cool head and stay alert to stay alive.
 
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