hso said;
If you've made the decision before hand that you will use your weapon to defend others in this kind of situation then you should carry additonal ammunition. If you've made the decision to use your weapon to defend yourself and those in your care and that you will break contact and withdraw then this may not be needed.
How many rounds does your
break contact drill require? I carry a 1911 with 8 rounds, a spare magazine and a Model 36 with an additional 5 rounds everytime I leave the house. My point is, you don't know how much ammo you might need to handle any situation you may encounter. If you carry a firearm, you should carry a reload. Better to have it and not need it, then need it and not have it.
Movement and communication are the other key point I take away. If you are involved in a incident like this you must keep what you say simple and clear so LE and others know who you are and what you are doing there.
There is a very real danger to everyone involved if you run to the sound of the guns. Virtually everyone has a cell phone these days. The calls into the 911 dispatch center are very likely to say that it's a terrorist attack with
two gunmen if you draw your weapon and charge into the fray. That information quite probably with your description, will be forwarded by radio or MDC to the responding officers. You are likely to be mis-identified as a bad guy before the police ever arrive. This will have bad consequences for you. If you are carrying a firearm, why aren't you carrying a cell phone? Before you move from where you are at you need to call the police department and identify yourself, give a good description of your appearance. Officer Hammond had his wife call 9111 for him. Fratricide is a very real issue. You not only have to worry about the police, but have to worry about other armed citizens, who won't have the police dispatcher giving them your description. I would recommend that you not call 911, but take the time to find out a non emergency number in your PD that you can call. 911 is going to be quickly overloaded and there may be several telecommunicators taking all the calls. There is a good chance your information may not make it to the responding officers until it's too late. Once you get through to the PD, stay on the phone. Most phones have a hands free or
driving mode option. turn it on and stick it in your shirt pocket. The information you can continue to provide will be invaluable to the responding officers. That is pretty much the limit of what you can do to identify yourself to the responding officers.
Now you have to deal with the problem of identifying yourself to other CCW holders who also may be responding. Bystanders may direct you after another armed citizen or off duty or plainclothes officer who is also responding. Now you have an interesting exercise in IFF (Identification of Friend and Foe). Is the guy the bystanders just directed you towards the gunman, another gunman, or a good guy responding? How will you know? What is your plan to find out? A gunfight between two friendlies is not unknown and unfortuanately an all too common occurance when the situation is very fluid and the participants aren't wearing uniforms.
If you are involved in a incident like this you must keep what you say simple and clear so LE and others know who you are and what you are doing there. If they ask for your participation you should pay attention to their communication style. "Moving Up", "Come To Me", "Cover Me" are heard in the tapes and they are standard language used in training I've attended.
The principles involved in moving aren't all that complicated, but if you haven't trained on them you're going to be hurting. Most people practice on the square range. Unfortuantely, that's all that's available to many. But quality force on force training is available. Get some. This isn't the kind of skill you can pick up by watching actors do it on the silver screen.
Years ago in another life, I used to have a trick exercise I used to teach this lesson to Infantrymen. It was a simple platoon attack. One squad of OPFOR in a defensive position v. a platoon of BLUFOR. The platoon would attak, take out the defensive position and probably take only a handful of casualties. They would be gathered around the AAR site smiling, patting each other on the back and feeling very good about themselves. I would start the AAR, about a third of the way through, I would reveal that the OPFOR had no batteries in their MILES transmitters. The grins and the general good feeling the victorious platoon felt about their tactical abilities stopped as soon as they realized that the three casualties they sustained during the attack were all fratricide. The rest of the AAR was devoted to who killed is buddy and how it happened.
If this can happen to trained Infantrymen who are all in the same uniform, fighting a foe who are all in a readily identifyable different uniform, what do you think the chances are it can happen to a group of people who have never seen each other before?
I'd like to remind everyone, that a CCW holder has no duty to act. Your CCW didn't come with a peace officers commission and a badge, and it certainly didn't come with a red cape and blue tights. Before you decide to get involved you need to take all of the points I just made into consideration and choke down the emotion that will make you want to respond and think real hard and rationally about if you can really make a difference or if your response may just make a bad situation worse. You should think really hard about what you actually know. It's one thing to respond if you see the bad guy in the act. It's a totally different situation if you run to the sound of gunfire.
I'm not going to tell anyone what to do. Everyone will have to make that decision for themselves. But you should make an educated decision. Good intentions will be cold comfort to your family when you are bleeding out from a sucking chest wound after you were shot by mistake. And good intentions aren't worth much in court in the wrongful death suit you'll inevitably face after you shot the wrong guy in a case of mistaken identity.
Jeff
