Double Naught Spy
New member
I have been impressed by the numbers of shooters that I have seen screw of simple shooting sequences and who do so mainly when the situation becomes atypical, suffer a distraction, or the like. As such, I would be inclined to believe that many who train to shoot two and only two shots and then reassess will likely find that they have shot numbers other than 2.
- people can't count shots under stress (giving several examples of those who claimed to have fired 1 or 2 shots and who fired several times as many or until the gun was empty
- you shoot ammo at your aggressor to save life, not to save ammo.
- there is no logic in not firing the last round if the threat still exists just because some guy at a gun school said it was a bad thing. A bad thing is a threat that hurts you because you didn't shoot it enough.
So you only put a couple of rounds in your gun?
Shooting is supposed to be dangerous. That is what makes shooting useful for self defense. The notion of not shooting enough rounds because you are afraid it will look bad in court reflects an improper ranking of priorities. The first priority is to survive the battle, not how it will look it court. How it looks in court doesn't matter if you are all screwed up or dead as a result.
While not specific to the number of rounds shot, here is a great example of a guy worrying about the legalities of his actions during an active shooter situation. The guy, Brandon (Danny) McKowan, was heralded as something of a hero of Tacoma Mall because he did intervene. He had his CCW with him, drew it, reholstered it because he wasn't sure if he could legally have his gun out, then stood from behind cover and verbally challenged the shooter who imediately shot him multiple times. Why wasn't his gun drawn? By his own admission, part of the reason is that he was afraid he would get in trouble for brandishing (see post#20 in the following link as the original news link is dead http://thefiringline.com/forums/showthread.php?t=188599&highlight=tacoma+mall). McKowan suffers permanent disabilities as a result of his injuries. http://www.danmckown.com/
Note that McKowan's shooter shot him once and as McKowan started to collapse, the shooter followed him down with shots. In short, the shooter neutralized the threat. Unfortunately, the threat was one of the good guys.
I carry a 1911 and 1 spare mag consistently, sometimes two spares. My idea of conservation of ammo is removing my self from the situation. Proximity to the threat, whether vertical or horizontal, is not a good thing. If I can get to safety before I am out of ammo, then I have conserved ammo.
When it comes to self defense, solve the problem at hand first. You can worry about ammo issues if and when they become an issue.
Back when I started attending Thunder Ranch in 2002 or 2003, there were students in the class who had attended other schools where it was being taught that letting your gun run out of ammo was a bad thing. It meant that you had not managed your ammo-on-board properly and left you defenseless until you reloaded which was then dictacted by your ammo level (0) and hence was not a conscious decision on your part which meant you might be changing mags while vulnerable. This came up with Clint Smith and he went into one of his ranting monologues about the stupidity of never running out of ammo-on-board which included such considerations as...I would think shooting till empty could be a bad thing.
- people can't count shots under stress (giving several examples of those who claimed to have fired 1 or 2 shots and who fired several times as many or until the gun was empty
- you shoot ammo at your aggressor to save life, not to save ammo.
- there is no logic in not firing the last round if the threat still exists just because some guy at a gun school said it was a bad thing. A bad thing is a threat that hurts you because you didn't shoot it enough.
Shooting a lot of rounds is a bad stragity. Dangerous and looks bad in court, and not necessary.
So you only put a couple of rounds in your gun?
Shooting is supposed to be dangerous. That is what makes shooting useful for self defense. The notion of not shooting enough rounds because you are afraid it will look bad in court reflects an improper ranking of priorities. The first priority is to survive the battle, not how it will look it court. How it looks in court doesn't matter if you are all screwed up or dead as a result.
While not specific to the number of rounds shot, here is a great example of a guy worrying about the legalities of his actions during an active shooter situation. The guy, Brandon (Danny) McKowan, was heralded as something of a hero of Tacoma Mall because he did intervene. He had his CCW with him, drew it, reholstered it because he wasn't sure if he could legally have his gun out, then stood from behind cover and verbally challenged the shooter who imediately shot him multiple times. Why wasn't his gun drawn? By his own admission, part of the reason is that he was afraid he would get in trouble for brandishing (see post#20 in the following link as the original news link is dead http://thefiringline.com/forums/showthread.php?t=188599&highlight=tacoma+mall). McKowan suffers permanent disabilities as a result of his injuries. http://www.danmckown.com/
Note that McKowan's shooter shot him once and as McKowan started to collapse, the shooter followed him down with shots. In short, the shooter neutralized the threat. Unfortunately, the threat was one of the good guys.
So I am wondering how different TFL members approach this problem? If you carry a 5-shot revolver or 1911 do you train to shoot and assess to conserve your limited ammo load?
I carry a 1911 and 1 spare mag consistently, sometimes two spares. My idea of conservation of ammo is removing my self from the situation. Proximity to the threat, whether vertical or horizontal, is not a good thing. If I can get to safety before I am out of ammo, then I have conserved ammo.
When it comes to self defense, solve the problem at hand first. You can worry about ammo issues if and when they become an issue.