Nighttime - Shotgun with no light vs. pistol w/ flashlight

[Vern Humphrey]

Bearing mind the old infantry adage, "Tracers work both ways," so do lights.

Since you have the home court advantage, why not do a little preparation of the battlefield? Set up a nightlight on the approach to your safe room, so the intruder is backlit. You can see your target, and he has no clue where you are until you see fit to open the ball.

 

[444]

Yes tracer works both ways, but white light isn't exactly the same as tracer. If you are using a very bright white light designed for this purpose the light will serve two purposes (in addition to letting you see): it will blind the person it is pointed at made all the worse by the fact that he isn't expecting it and the fact that his pupils are dilated from being in the dark. Second, it will not enable him to pinpoint your location exactly. This is what Surefire calls the veil of light. Appearently this is a common tactic used by police officers with car headlights. The lights are shining in your eyes and you can't really pick out exacly where the people behind it are.
Now I agree that walking around with a flashlight or weaponlight turned on continuously searching is a very bad idea. You need to use the light when you need it, and then move. At best, he knows you are there and where you were a minute ago. Also at best you now know where he wasn't a minute ago. The fact of the matter is that there are some situations where you need to find this guy and you can't do it in the dark. You are going to have to use light (unless you have a dog that will do the work for you). So, you need to know how to correctly use the light to maximum advantage for you.
This takes nothing away from barracaiding yourself in a room. If they decide to kick in the door, you hit them with white light and fire.

 

[Vern Humphrey]

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but white light isn't exactly the same as tracer. If you are using a very bright white light designed for this purpose the light will serve two purposes (in addition to letting you see): it will blind the person it is pointed at made all the worse by the fact that he isn't expecting it and the fact that his pupils are dilated from being in the dark.
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That assumes he's in front of you and not somewhere else when the light goes on, and that he's alone.

I'd much rather have him silhouetted by a dim light behind him and put him down, than trust that I could blind hi.

 

[444]

"That assumes he's in front of you and not somewhere else when the light goes on, and that he's alone."

Well, I am asuming that you are turning on the light to illuminate him and not walking around with the light on. Obviously if there is more than one person located a distance away from the first one, you have a problem. I know in my house there is a pretty decent amount of light coming in through the windows even though the blinds are closed. If my eyes are adjusted to the dark, I could easily walk around my house without additional artificial light and I could pretty easily see if someone was in the house as long as they were making a big effort to hide. If they were making a big effort to hide, noise would give them away. In my particular case I would simply walk towards the screaming and the sound of breaking bones as my dog had his way with him.


"I'd much rather have him silhouetted by a dim light behind him and put him down, than trust that I could blind hi (m)."
I have complete trust in blinding him. The only way to prevent it would be for him to close his eyes. I have played around with these lights many times at night during night shoots at the various shooting schools and know that there is no way to prevent being blinded by them. It would be nice if he was silhouetted against some other form of light, but I want to identify my target and if I need to shoot, I want to be able to aim; therefore, I am using a light.

 

[Vern Humphrey]

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I have complete trust in blinding him. The only way to prevent it would be for him to close his eyes.
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If he's alone. If there's more than one, then you may not survive to blind the other guy.

We had a rule in Viet Nam -- always initiate an ambush with a casualty- producing weapon. Lights don't produce casualties.

 

[444]

True: Lights don't produce casualties, they only assist in producing casualties, assist in your own survival, and possibly prevent you from making a big mistake.
Light assists in producing casualities by allowing you to identify the targets location, by allowing you to aim at the target, and by blinding the target or startling the target so his possible return fire is inaccurate or delayed.
Light asists in your own survival for the reasons listed above. Being able to see your target and being able to use your sights allows you to take him out of the fight more quicly than misses, and poor shots. Making his fire inaccurate or delayed works directly to your benefit.
Light assists in the prevention of mistakes: firing at targets you would not have engaged if you had correctly identified the target. Since it also helps with your own accurate fire, it might prevent your firing a shot off target that goes on to strike something you didn't want it to. My house is not Vietnam or a free fire zone. I am responsible for every shot I fire. I want to KNOW what I am shooting at, and exactly WHERE they are. Personally, I am not going to simply fire at anything that doesn't look right in my house. YMMV.

One of the problems with these discussions is that someone can always come up with a senario that flys in the face of the last post. Of course if there is a Columbian hit team or an infantry battalion or the walking dead you very well might have a problem if you light up and engage only one of them. I am not sure how this differs from engaging only one of them without a light. Once you fire, they know you are there and they know your approximate location. If you use a light, they know you are there and they know your approximate location.

If someone chooses not to use white light as part of their home defense equipment, fine. Just realize that you are in a significant minority. People who do this sort of thing for a living, namely the police and military use light. It might be infared light, but it is light never the less.

 

[Vern Humphrey]

Backlighting will do everything that needs to be done -- and not give anyone a clue to your location until you're ready.

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People who do this sort of thing for a living, namely the police and military use light.
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Nobody does this sort of thing for a living -- we're talking about a home invasion, and no one makes his living by having his own home invaded. That's why tactics based on different situations are not always appropriate here.

 

[444]

Having your home invaded isn't the topic. Using a shotgun with no light or a handgun with a light is. There are people who do building searches, engage in combat with handguns and shotguns, and engage bad guys for a living. I trust their experience in the matter.

Vern, I will give you one thing, you are persistent and you WILL have the last word.
So, go ahead, have the last word. I have wasted enough bandwidth.

 

[DigMe]

444,

I agree that having a bright, blinding light can be a good thing and often it probably does work to startle and surprise a victim...however, many people have proven that whole "he'll be blinded and unable to shoot or react" theory completely wrong by experimenting with airsoft guns and training rounds. I think if you were an armed bad guy your instinct would be to shoot in the direction of the light anyway. The BG might not be able to see your head but shining a surefire in someone's eyes is far from an immunization to getting shot.

brad cook

 

[444]

"The BG might not be able to see your head but shining a surefire in someone's eyes is far from an immunization to getting shot."

And where did I say it was ?

Maybe here ?
"by blinding the target or startling the target so his possible return fire is inaccurate or delayed."

Oh wait, no that couldn't be it, that is saying that he very well might fire.

Of course not using a light might make you immune to getting shot ?
No, I dont' think that is it either.
In reality there is only one thing that MIGHT make you immune to getting shot and that is placing a load of buckshot COM on the guy. Doing that is a lot easier when you can see the target and see your sights. So let's go over this one more time. You see where the guy is, you bring the weapon up to a firing position, you activate the light, you fire. You leave the light on the target long enough to determine if he is, or is not out of the fight. Light makes it easier for you to see him, light makes it easier to aim at him, light makes it harder for him to see you, light makes it harder for him to accurately fire at you, light makes accessing the effect of your shot or shots easier. Nothing in there about activating a force field or anthing.
There are no guarentees and a load of buckshot isn't one either. But it beats light, no light, handgun or pretty much anything else.

 

[stevelyn]

I'll keep my reply simple and relevant to the original question.

The handgun equiped with the light. Why? If you must shoot, positive target identification is an absolute must. It will play out in court better if you can articulate that you a retina searing light attatched to your defensive weapon and could identify the ventilated as being a threat to life and limb. Much better than the proverbial shot in the dark.

 

[Heraclitus]

Unfortunately, flashlight = homing beacon.

Anyone game for night-vision goggles?

 

[Vern Humphrey]

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Having your home invaded isn't the topic. Using a shotgun with no light or a handgun with a light is.
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How would the AVERAGE joe, outside of his home, get into a situation where he'd have to clear a building?

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There are people who do building searches, engage in combat with handguns and shotguns, and engage bad guys for a living. I trust their experience in the matter.
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And if I had their job, I would, too. But that would be a topic for a cop forum.

From my own experience in clearing houses, a few .50 Cal machineguns, a demolition kit, and grenades are a great help.