Active shooter response

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... but I'm compelled to post for the benefit of civilian lurkers. All these hopefully well-meaning admonitions that I (and you) need "more training so we'll understand" are not necessarily useful, and though instruction is fine no one should feel inadequate just because they don't have "professional" training. Often LE and ex-LE see the world only through a police lens, and sincerely believe they have all the answers. They don't. ...

Compelled? For the benefit of 'civilians'? So nobody lacking formal training in a specific, highly dangerous and volatile subject matter will "feel inadequate"? What if lacking the training does make someone much less knowledgeable and less prepared to encounter an active shooter incident? You want them to have a false sense of confidence and just jump in?

If you're posting for the benefit of non-LE folks who haven't had the opportunity to learn how things can unfold in the chaos of a dynamic and rapidly evolving active shooter situation, you might give some consideration to whether your comments might cause some of the folks unfamiliar with professional preparation for such events, and knowledgeable of what can happen in them, to mistakenly gain an unjustified sense of self confidence. Caution may pull someone in one direction, but unjustified confidence may pull them in the opposite direction.

Sure, LE (whether active or retired) often tend to see the world through their training and experience, including their acquired experiential knowledge. The more time they have/had on the job, and the more varied and demanding their job responsibilities and experiences, the more opportunity they often have to gain insight from their OJT, too. The ones who leave the field early, for whatever reason (voluntary or involuntary), are obviously going to have less opportunity to develop that training knowledge base and acquired experiential knowledge than the ones who put in their 20 or more years. (Well, there's also a dismaying number of "20yr veterans" who stop learning and developing in their first year, and just keep repeating that first year over and over until they retire, but thyat's another subject.)

...
My point is this: Armed citizens are significantly more successful at stopping an active shooter than police, and one might also note they killed NO innocent people. This same pattern holds true throughout all statistics involving citizens compared to LE in all armed encounters: civilians have a much higher hit/ammo expended ratio, and a much higher overall success ratio. ...

Cherry-picking 25 incidents doesn't exactly mean you've stumbled upon something that's suddenly (mistakenly) axiomatic, let alone 'predictive' for the next couple hundred incidents.

Also, consider that in some LE OIS incidents where more rounds have been expended that may have been because the incident involved more than 1 officer/shooter, meaning 2 or several. Some suspects may not be as quickly affected by GSW's and quickly stop their deadly force actions as soon as others might, too.

Unless you're also going to find incidents where more than one non-LE "good guy" shooters were involved in using deadly force in the same incident at the same time, it's somewhat of a different situation.

Besides, as has been said by subject matter experts in the field time and again, since the identical circumstances and people aren't going to be involved in repeating the same shooting incident time and again, each shooting incident is virtually a unique event.

We can train cops to perform weapon handling and shooting skills and tactics in a variety of situations that can be created for training and qualification scenarios, but ultimately we have to be able to rely upon their ability to draw upon varied skills and training experiences and apply them as may be necessary for any combination of events which they may encounter. Less variety of training, not sufficiently reinforced by recurrent training and practice, can make for "less" for them to try and draw upon in their moment of need.
 
Besides, as has been said by subject matter experts in the field time and again, since the identical circumstances and people aren't going to be involved in repeating the same shooting incident time and again, each shooting incident is virtually a unique event.

As with things in my field, there are so many unique circumstances. Simulations may be helpful to understand general principles, but I have also seen simulations cause people to think too rigidly when a dynamic situation exists. Trying to make the real world fit into what you might have learned from simulations doesn't always work.
 
In the event of an active shooter situation assuming my wife and I are there together the first thing I'm going to do is try to get my wife out of the area.
+1 (+2 actually)

I’m a retired Instrumentation and Control Tech, and my wife is a retired Administrative Assistant. Neither of us has any training, experience or education when it comes to engaging active shooters. Because engaging active shooters is not in the ordinary lines of work for I&C Techs and Secretaries.;)

Still, I’m going to add just one more twist to this conversation. I know how to do that.:D

My wife also carries, and she’s great with handguns – better than me. In fact, she’s better with handguns than most men I know, and she’s helped out several women friends who came to her asking advice about handguns and concealed carry.

Anyway, while out pheasant hunting a few years back, I fell and broke my right ankle on both sides, and put a spiral break up my right fibula. After the operation, they fitted me with a boot that went clear up to my knee. With that boot and a pair of crutches I could get around somewhat, and I started going back to church.

There’s already plenty of threads and posts about carry at church, and I’m not trying to distract from this thread by going on about that. I’m just saying, I carry at church; so does my wife. And it is my sincere hope, as well as my belief, that a few years back when my ankle and leg was all busted up, if an active shooter would have come into our church on a Sunday morning, my wife’s first thought would have been to get me to safety – just like my getting her to safety would be my first thought if the “boot” was ever on the other foot, so to speak. If getting my wife to safety involved engaging the active shooter first, so be it. And if killing the active shooter to get my wife to safety is what it took, I would if I could. I’d expect no less from my wife.

But engaging an active shooter without first making sure my loved ones are out of danger? Oh, no. And once my loved ones are out of danger, me going back to engage the active shooter, putting my own life and well-being (including possibly my wife’s and my financial well-being) at risk? No to that too. That would be irresponsible. And I can assure everyone here – my wife feels the same way, even though she can outshoot most of y’all with a handgun.:D
 
Simulations may be helpful to understand general principles, but I have also seen simulations cause people to think too rigidly when a dynamic situation exists. Trying to make the real world fit into what you might have learned from simulations doesn't always work.

I’ve got almost 40 years experience in military and LE training. The simulations used are not static. They are deliberately designed to make the participants think. The scenario is changed once a training objective is met. The scenario starts simple with maybe one or two training objectives. Once the soldier/LE Officer/squad/team meets those objectives additional elements are added. These can be as simple fro performing the task in the dark instead of daylight or as complicated as changing the number of OPFOR, adding casualties, civilian role players to distract them from their mission, disabling a critical piece of equipment or communications....the possibilities are almost endless.

You have to train that way because it becomes like a video game if you don’t. After a few iterations everyone knows what’s coming next.

Properly planned and conducted training does not teach rigid thinking. It teaches dynamic thinking.
 
As with things in my field, there are so many unique circumstances.
Yes.

Simulations may be helpful to understand general principles,...
I do not think that I would so describe the objective of simulation.

The purpose of simulation, in the context at hand, is to train student to effect timely, effective actions in rapidly unfolding, realistic exercises that take different twists and turns ecch time they are run.

I have also seen simulations cause people to think too rigidly when a dynamic situation exists.
I would suggest that the simulation was either poorly designed or poorly applied, or that the tools were insufficiently robust.

Trying to make the real world fit into what you might have learned from simulations doesn't always work.
I do not understand what you are trying to say.
 
Kleanbore,

My experience with simulations involves teaching surgeons in training how to do procedures. The best teaching simulation would be a live animal, but labs of that kind are expensive and controversial, so many times either a cadaver, or worse yet, a mechanical simulation. Perhaps the simulations I am referring to are too complex to apply to the scenarios that could be involved in an active shooter situation.
 
I don’t know if they are more complex then combat. Perhaps a better simulator could be developed. I don’t know what it would cost but I’m sure the technology exists to develop a mechanical or perhaps a virtual reality simulator that could replicate everything that can happen in the OR. I would imagine that no one wants to spend the money to develop such a simulator as the market for it might not cover the cost.

Combat simulators have made huge advancements from the days when umpires made judgement calls of who was killed and who wasn’t.
 
I’ve got almost 40 years experience in military and LE training. The simulations used are not static. They are deliberately designed to make the participants think. The scenario is changed once a training objective is met. The scenario starts simple with maybe one or two training objectives. Once the soldier/LE Officer/squad/team meets those objectives additional elements are added. These can be as simple fro performing the task in the dark instead of daylight or as complicated as changing the number of OPFOR, adding casualties, civilian role players to distract them from their mission, disabling a critical piece of equipment or communications....the possibilities are almost endless.

You have to train that way because it becomes like a video game if you don’t. After a few iterations everyone knows what’s coming next.

Properly planned and conducted training does not teach rigid thinking. It teaches dynamic thinking.

This has gotten me curious. It's been a long time since I've been around many law officers in shooting and hunting circles. My impression then was that some of them were very good with a gun, but mainly due to training and practice they sought as individuals mostly on their own time at their own expense.

Has this changed? Do we now have a new class of officers you'd now feel were completely competent to handle a dynamic situation unfolding in as you described it, "the fog of war" whose only training or primary training comes from what their own departments offer or are willing to pay for from outside sources?

Have complex simulators changed the training environment to the point that what an older shooter from a different time and era learned in the field--and perhaps when he was lucky from those with more experience--have these old fashioned models become obsolescent to the point of virtual uselessness?

Since it's so difficult to convey tone in flat prose I want to make it as clear as I can that I'm asking this with respect and out of curiosity and I intend no irony. There's no way I can personally judge the value of training techniques I haven't seen.
 
Training has changed a lot since I started in LE in 1985. There are mobile training units that make expensive simulators like F.A.T.S. available to small departments. DHS has funded a lot of training since 9-11. Good, up to date training is available to almost any department that wants it at minimal cost.

I hate to say it but the continual civil suits have had a lot to do with departments spending more resources on training then they had in the in the past.

It’s still not optimal but it’s a lot better then it was. I can only speak for what’s available here but from talking to peers in the community things are better all over. There are competent organizations like the NTOA ( National Tactical Officers Association) and private companies like the Public Agency Training Council that provide good and up to date training,

As I stated much of this training is subsidized by either state Police Standards and Training Boards or Department of Homeland Security. In many cases the only cost to the agency is the overtime for the officers to attend.

I paid for a lot of training out of pocket when I was working but I always took it back to my department.
 
As with things in my field, there are so many unique circumstances. Simulations may be helpful to understand general principles, but I have also seen simulations cause people to think too rigidly when a dynamic situation exists. Trying to make the real world fit into what you might have learned from simulations doesn't always work.

Simulations are a good tool for assessing someone's skill in a carefully designed set of circumstances. The people being assessed ought to already have a grasp of general principles. You're not teaching firearms training in simulators, you're observing and assessing decision-making, judgment, application of policy and watching how people generally react under artificially induced stress. It's interesting to watch people occasionally grasp that sometimes it's not doing something they're expecting to have to do is the right thing to do.

Simulators can even help someone engage in some self assessment, and hopefully help them realize some issues in their own judgment and decision-making processes. They can even be helpful in seeing how someone may be able to apply previously learned knowledge and skills to solving new situations (but again, within carefully designed and controlled circumstances).

Yep, if people only learn how to "game" the simulations it may not help them learn to recognize and address actual problems in the chaos of an unexpected, dynamic and rapidly evolving situation where you won't get a "reset" opportunity. Branching and flexible on-the-fly simulations can help, but you're still subject to what someone has programmed into the scenario, and bad guys (and even bystander good guys) can be unpredictable. They sometimes act in ways that even they can't explain afterward.

As good as the new generations of simulators have become, it's probably the force-on-force training that's going to be saving the lives of more cops (and innocent bystanders) than anything else. There's been some good development in this, too.

The UTM products are expensive, but the products are allowing for some enhanced reliability and continuing attention to participant safety in role-playing. Being able to quickly convert an officers existing duty weapon (pistol and rifle) and still benefit from a live round lock-out safety feature is going to let people train with their own guns (including their attached lights). Sure, the conversion slides/barrels and bolts aren't inexpensive, but the cost of losing even one lawsuit, let alone a life, is going to make such costs seem a lot less expensive. I've been discussing this training equipment line with someone who has tested it (and compared it to existing guns modified to use with another dye marking cartridge product). Their agency is adopting it and it's going to be employed in their shoot house. I'll probably try it later this year or early next year. The 2 primary advantages discussed have been the outstanding reliability of individual converted weapons and the live round lockout feature. https://utmworldwide.com/
 
Run away, seek cover and concealment.

Only engage if directly confronted on your way to safety. Immediately reholster and keep fleeing.

If you can help it, don’t engage bad guys in public unless you’re a uniformed good guy.

I could not say it better myself.
 
Ok bullets are flying....I have a gun...I want to help save lives. I am the first on the scene. How does Mr. Policeman and John Public know I there to help and not a threat? How do you keep from getting shot from friendly fire?

Run away, seek cover and concealment.

Only engage if directly confronted on your way to safety. Immediately reholster and keep fleeing.

If you can help it, don’t engage bad guys in public unless you’re a uniformed good guy.

This will be the standard line, blue brick. Even though I would not follow that same advice myself, I would never recommend on an open forum to someone I’ve never met that he do anything but what wisco says.
Be aware/ educate yourself on the dangers... the chances of getting shot are high... to answer your question: mr policeman and John public WONT know you’re not the threat. You very likely could get shot by a friendly and are as equally likely to shoot another responder such as yourself. Can you live with that? Are you ok with the legal battle to follow and the possibility of having to move to a new town even if you do everything right? How about the psychological effects? Read some of Dave grossmans stuff. Are you ok with peeing/ crapping your pants in public and having doubts or depression for months? On the flip side can you live with yourself later if you ran away and poeple die. These are deeply personal questions that everyone needs to answer for themselves... but try to be realistic. And be sure that you wife is ok with you dying/ disabled for those reasons too.

In my case ( yeah, gonna catch some flack for this..) I accept the risk. Police response time in my area is 20 minutes and I know more than half of the deputies personally as well as the sheriff.( though even that doesn’t guarantee they won’t shoot me) I have trained with many of them in scenarios and have a good idea of how they identify threats. Additionally the law enforcement here ASKS citizens who are able and willing to respond... and when they show up on the scene they will be actively looking to identify the friendlies... but the area I live in is definitely the exception in the world today . YMWV - you milage WILL vary
 
The truest American heroes of the last several years to me are the two men that worked together to engage the Sutherland Springs Church shooter. The hero in this case was a barefooted man carrying an AR15 firing into a church parking lot - not exactly looking like a cop. As he told Crowder, “every time I heard a shot I knew someone that I knew was dying.” He surely would have laid down his life in the act of trying to stop the shooter.

I wish this attitude were more pervasive in responding to these mass shootings. I get the feeling from the expert discussion that one or ten or fifty deaths due to inaction are preferable to one death due to action. Hence you get standoffs measured in hours while people bleed out or a shooter gets his second wind.

If you haven’t read the essay “Hold! Enough!” in Jeff Cooper’s, “To Ride, Shoot Straight and Speak the Truth” I highly recommend it. The main thrust is that a societal shift toward running for the hills and letting the professionals handle it every time violence is offered encourages further violence and is generally contemptible behavior. That plus the fact the professional approach is sometimes to pull back and wait it out leads to some really unconscionable outcomes.
 
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Run away, seek cover and concealment.

Only engage if directly confronted on your way to safety. Immediately reholster and keep fleeing.

If you can help it, don’t engage bad guys in public unless you’re a uniformed good guy.

Excellent advice.
 
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I am sorry but the advice to do nothing unless forced on your way to flee just means your guns probably will get taken away.
I remember when concealed carry was sweeping the nation and everyone including many here claimed how more guns in the hands of people would reduce the harm posed.
Now the consensus is to let the authorities deal with it?
An active shooter is probably the easiest thing for a good guy with a gun to deal with. The bad guy is much more obvious and whether lethal force is justified not even close to a gray area. If you cant even help in that situation how much better would you be in more complicated scenarios?

If you are armed, you are probably one of a limited few armed. People during employment are frequently unarmed even if legal as a result of following almost universal bans on carrying by employers. Most places have laws against being intoxicated while armed which means if they are drinking at a bar or restauraunt and following the law should be disarmed. Some may be going to and from places that prohibit having loaded firearms like school grounds or other no gun locations. And those are just the minority that are legally allowed to carry.
Others are prohibited persons, too young, or a variety of other things besides just not choosing to be armed.
There is a very good chance you are one of few armed people in the area.
This is not to say anyone should be required to do anything, if you want to flee that is fine. However recommending it to everyone else as the only wise choice, and criticising those that would make another choice, even to those willing to do something means we must rely on the police state. Police are often far away, at least several minutes out unless they are doing security at some event.
If that is going to be the case then the argument of the harm prevented versus the harm created by these guns starts to favor trusting the government to not be too big of bullies as the only ones with arms capable of inflicting a lot of damage, and not keeping the balance the founders intended. It doesnt tend to work out, but is the direction things will go.
If you know you are going towards a deadly situation where the threat is not only the bad guy but other people looking to kill an armed bad guy, you can try to mitigate that. You have a sidearm, the bad guy probably has a long gun.
You can try to figure out how to keep from being too readily seen as an armed threat while not so concealed its unuseable when you find the guy that will probably shoot at you rather quickly.
It is stressful and challenging, many bad guys are in body armor, may look like police or security, and there will also be police or security looking for the bad guy either quickly, or within several minutes, unless you live someplace they are even further away. Your brain will have a lot to process.
Of course a dead giveaway is seeing them shoot at multiple people, particularly if the targets are not armed or a threat.
If you run across a team of law enforcement on your way then they are going to do a much better job and try not to seem armed and cease finding the bad guy.
Do not sit anywhere with your gun out, the guy responding that comes up behind may shoot you dead. Do not even keep it out to cover the bad guy. Assesss constantly and keep the gun hidden except when engaging. The more minutes that go by the more likely you are to run across law enforcement, and the less useful you are likely to be.

If you saved me or someone I care about I would be quite greatful.
 
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