I have worked in medicine now for... Jeeze... 18 years...
My god, has it really been that long?
I spent most of this time working as an EMT and then Paramedic in busy metropolitan areas and then transitioned into Emergency Rooms and Intensive Care Units.
Like the author of THIS article, I have seen a lot of trauma caused by projectiles. I have had a patient dropped onto my stretcher barely alive and been unable to intervene when a .22 LR from 50m away worked its way between his ribs and shredded his aorta. I have held a conversation with a young man who was shot 8 times with .45 ACP including a ding to the head that exposed his brain; he WALKED to our truck and lived. I have seen a 9mm mob-style execution go wrong with a perfectly conscious victim refusing to talk to the police afterwards. I also remember an interesting case where a young man came in after a brutal beating with signs of a traumatic brain injury (TBI) and we didn't even realize that he had been shot with a .22 in the head at point-blank range until a radiologist "saw something" in his head film.
While we can all throw up tables and numbers and physics and ballistics tests and videos of gel blocks getting shot in slow motion... Any healthcare professional or individual who has been exposed to trauma will tell you people can survive a tremendous amount of punishment and live while at the same time the body can seem frail and require so little to put it out of commission.
If a projectile is placed correctly it can incapacitate or kill its target. This includes ANY projectile. I was working Kenmore Square in Boston during the 2004 American League Championship Series when the Red Sox beat the Yankees and a good old sports riot ensued. Victoria Snelgrove, a young college student, was caught in crowd dispersal intervention by Boston Police and was struck near the eye with a "Less Than Lethal" pepper spray projectile from an FN 303. The impact caused her to hemorrhage into the brain resulting in her death.
Curtis James Jackson III, also known as the derivative and mediocre rapper "50-cent" was shot 9 times in 2000 while in a car outside of his grandmother's house. The assailant fired a 9mm handgun at close range hitting him in his hand, arm, hip, both legs, chest and left cheek. The dude went on to recover fully and produce terrible music.
The lethality, stopping power, velocity, momentum, kinetic energy, and ballistics of whatever you're shooting is interesting and important stuff to talk about. It is also really nerdy, which I absolutely LOVE. However the first and MOST important aspect of defense, the aspect that is so far ahead of the others as to take up 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place, is shot placement. If you cannot hit what you want the size of your bullet and muzzle velocity means absolutely nothing.
I chose a 9mm as my daily CCW. Why? Because with my Shield I can put 8 shots into a 3-inch circle at 7-yards in several seconds under stressful conditions from the draw to the last round. My wife chose a .380. Why? Because she can accomplish a similar feat with her Bodyguard... And she thought it was "cute".
If I were going to chose a defensive firearm based on how often I have seen one be lethal beyond repair it would be a 12g shotgun with basically anything metal loaded into it. I have yet to see someone take one of those to a chest and walk away.
To take it a step further the most vicious and disturbing injuries I have seen have been caused by blades...
In any case, if you are struggling to choose which caliber is best for your defense, remember this post. While you may feel more like a big boy for having that .45 under your shoulder or .40 on your hip, if you can't reliably hit a human-sized target quickly and accurately, you're just carrying a paperweight that goes "bang".
Yes, larger rounds create more damage. Yes, hotter rounds penetrate deeper. Yes, permanent cavity this and temporary cavity that and hydro-shock the other thing... But none of that matters if you can't hit a damn thing.
So, go shoot some stuff. Shoot as much as you can. Shoot different guns and different calibers. Take a course or two and then practice those lessons at the range. Buy a CO2 airsoft pistol and practice your draw and fire. Practice firing from retention while getting assaulted. Get comfortable with your weapon, become proficient with it, and learn to respect it. Gain, fine-tune, and improve your SKILLS before you just go out there and upgrade the caliber. If you start off only being able to handle a .22 pistol with passable results but you start producing groups that look like a 20g at 25-yards as soon as you move up to something like a .308, you may want to rethink carrying that Glock around town.
And this is also why I try not to get involved in thread derailments about pistol calibers... So I thought it best to get it all out there in a thread of its own.
My god, has it really been that long?
I spent most of this time working as an EMT and then Paramedic in busy metropolitan areas and then transitioned into Emergency Rooms and Intensive Care Units.
Like the author of THIS article, I have seen a lot of trauma caused by projectiles. I have had a patient dropped onto my stretcher barely alive and been unable to intervene when a .22 LR from 50m away worked its way between his ribs and shredded his aorta. I have held a conversation with a young man who was shot 8 times with .45 ACP including a ding to the head that exposed his brain; he WALKED to our truck and lived. I have seen a 9mm mob-style execution go wrong with a perfectly conscious victim refusing to talk to the police afterwards. I also remember an interesting case where a young man came in after a brutal beating with signs of a traumatic brain injury (TBI) and we didn't even realize that he had been shot with a .22 in the head at point-blank range until a radiologist "saw something" in his head film.
While we can all throw up tables and numbers and physics and ballistics tests and videos of gel blocks getting shot in slow motion... Any healthcare professional or individual who has been exposed to trauma will tell you people can survive a tremendous amount of punishment and live while at the same time the body can seem frail and require so little to put it out of commission.
If a projectile is placed correctly it can incapacitate or kill its target. This includes ANY projectile. I was working Kenmore Square in Boston during the 2004 American League Championship Series when the Red Sox beat the Yankees and a good old sports riot ensued. Victoria Snelgrove, a young college student, was caught in crowd dispersal intervention by Boston Police and was struck near the eye with a "Less Than Lethal" pepper spray projectile from an FN 303. The impact caused her to hemorrhage into the brain resulting in her death.
Curtis James Jackson III, also known as the derivative and mediocre rapper "50-cent" was shot 9 times in 2000 while in a car outside of his grandmother's house. The assailant fired a 9mm handgun at close range hitting him in his hand, arm, hip, both legs, chest and left cheek. The dude went on to recover fully and produce terrible music.
The lethality, stopping power, velocity, momentum, kinetic energy, and ballistics of whatever you're shooting is interesting and important stuff to talk about. It is also really nerdy, which I absolutely LOVE. However the first and MOST important aspect of defense, the aspect that is so far ahead of the others as to take up 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place, is shot placement. If you cannot hit what you want the size of your bullet and muzzle velocity means absolutely nothing.
I chose a 9mm as my daily CCW. Why? Because with my Shield I can put 8 shots into a 3-inch circle at 7-yards in several seconds under stressful conditions from the draw to the last round. My wife chose a .380. Why? Because she can accomplish a similar feat with her Bodyguard... And she thought it was "cute".
If I were going to chose a defensive firearm based on how often I have seen one be lethal beyond repair it would be a 12g shotgun with basically anything metal loaded into it. I have yet to see someone take one of those to a chest and walk away.
To take it a step further the most vicious and disturbing injuries I have seen have been caused by blades...
In any case, if you are struggling to choose which caliber is best for your defense, remember this post. While you may feel more like a big boy for having that .45 under your shoulder or .40 on your hip, if you can't reliably hit a human-sized target quickly and accurately, you're just carrying a paperweight that goes "bang".
Yes, larger rounds create more damage. Yes, hotter rounds penetrate deeper. Yes, permanent cavity this and temporary cavity that and hydro-shock the other thing... But none of that matters if you can't hit a damn thing.
So, go shoot some stuff. Shoot as much as you can. Shoot different guns and different calibers. Take a course or two and then practice those lessons at the range. Buy a CO2 airsoft pistol and practice your draw and fire. Practice firing from retention while getting assaulted. Get comfortable with your weapon, become proficient with it, and learn to respect it. Gain, fine-tune, and improve your SKILLS before you just go out there and upgrade the caliber. If you start off only being able to handle a .22 pistol with passable results but you start producing groups that look like a 20g at 25-yards as soon as you move up to something like a .308, you may want to rethink carrying that Glock around town.
And this is also why I try not to get involved in thread derailments about pistol calibers... So I thought it best to get it all out there in a thread of its own.
Last edited:
