Fortunately the only times I ever had to fire my .357 in uniform it was to kill two dogs and one injured cat.
Three shots each on the dogs, two on the cat, full-bore .357 loads.
The muzzle blast didn't even register. The cat was at night, the muzzle flash didn't even come close to blinding me.
(Fuff, in my part of the country up here in Utah in the 1970s, if you carried a .357 on duty it was because you wanted it to be a .357 Magnum. I can't recall anybody I worked with back in the heyday of the Smith 19s, 27s, and 28s who loaded up with .38+P for the road. And that included one pretty savvy Arizona trooper who worked your northern border and used to come to some of our training classes in St. George. The two FBI agents who put on a shoot for us down there also carried .357 Mags in their Model 13s.)
Years later I happened to be standing about six feet away from a fellow cop when he fired one shot from his 9mm pistol through the open doorway of a house. We were under a porch overhang extension of the roof, and next to a wall that extended from the garage at the front of the house. In other words, partially closed in on the left, front, and above.
The shot sounded to me like a very small firecracker going off.
During moments when your attention is elsewhere (hostile dogs running loose, hostile guy with hatchet in hand advancing), you don't notice the noise.
Those who've fired a .357 Mag hunting will tell you the same.
Repeated exposure will cause damage. Extremely close proximity can cause damage.
Otherwise, the .357 Mag is perfectly survivable from behind the trigger.
I've also done nighttime testing using several .357 loads through a ported 3-inch Ruger GP, some were brighter than others, those with flash-retardant powders were barely noticeable. Even the brightest were hardly blinding.
Denis
