Active Shooter Scenarios

 

The number of senseless shooting seems to be escalating.  The question many people ask is, "how do I defend myself in that type of scenario?" Once you learn the methods taught in Extreme Combat you will be able to defend yourself in any circumstance. An active shooter situation is no exception. If you are properly trained, you can counter their violent attack. In fact, since the attackers gun might not even be pointed at you, you may have a greater chance of survival than if you faced a "one on one" encounter with a criminal.

 

One of the principles we teach in Extreme Combat is situational awareness. It's how to be aware of your surroundings and the people you encounter, and how to be in a ready condition. Too often, victims are caught off guard. The lesson is to keep your guard up by being aware of what is going on around you.

 

In most active shooter engagements, those in closest proximity to the shooter's initial shots were usually taken off guard and surprised. As expected, most did not survive or were seriously wounded. Being prepared for the unexpected is no easy task and even professionals can be taken off guard. Attempting to identify an active shooter before shots are fired is also not an easy task. You can, however, with proper training learn to be in an aware state and ready for action.  You can keep your guard high and mitigate the likelihood of being caught by surprise.

 

If you are in the path of an active shooter, being able to survive and counter the initial shots is easier said than done.  In fact, there are multiple incidents when law enforcement officers were taken by surprise, with deadly consequences.

 

Too often police are multitasking, listening to communications, answering calls, assisting civilians, or performing a specific task. They are also on the job all day, or all night.  For a preoccupied officer, having momentary lapses in awareness runs a higher probability.  As a citizen, you actually have a greater ability to stay aware in public places due to a less intensive schedule, shorter duration, and less distractions, if you learn to focus.

 

The emphasis here is that people do not rise to the occasion, they default to their level of training.  Having taught martial arts and weapon training to law enforcement, I have learned that some of them do not take self defense training serious enough.  Unless they are members of a SWAT team, or make an effort to enhance their skills, many are ill equipped to handle an active shooter scenario.  Some police departments, often due to budgetary restrictions, simply do not offer enough training.

 

In our Active Shooter Training Program, we help students identify the possible active shooter and to have a predetermined contingency plan of action.

 

The most common advice given to survive an active shooter scenario was, I believe, initiated by the Department of Homeland Security.  Their advice is to Run, Hide, and Fight. That is the advice they offer to the general public, governmental agencies, and corporate employees.  On the surface it sounds like practical, sound advice.  However, upon further scrutiny and examination, it is a highly flawed strategy.

 

If you think about it, within each person the fight or flight syndrome is already hardwired. When there are gun shots and people falling, most people do not need a government agency to tell them to run.  That is what the majority of people will naturally do.  If they are unable to run, they will attempt to hide. Essentially the advice given by our government is not very instructional or profound.  They are simply telling everyone to do what a scared mob naturally does.  Wonder how many tax dollars were wasted on that study?

 

Advising someone to try to escape sounds like a good strategy, however a person could easily be running into the path of a second shooter, or the wrong direction, or into a dead end.  Still, trying to escape is one of the best options for most people.

 

Trying to hide is also too often a problematic strategy. Attempting to cower under a desk, behind an obstacle, or in a corner, too often makes you a sitting duck without any defensive strategy.  In most active shooting incidents, victims who were shot and killed, did try to either run or hide.  It's just not a strategy that works when you are in close proximity to an active shooter.

 

The government's final advice, if all else fails, is to fight. Unfortunately, the fighting part of the fight or flight syndrome has pretty much been systematically programmed out of the average citizens.  Most people simply do not know how to fight. So essentially telling people to run, hide, and fight is for all practical purposes, nothing more than useless information.

 

As stated, in an active shooter situation, the average person, if given the opportunity, will attempt to run.  In news footage involving active shooters, you can see people running away from the dangerous situation.  You do not have to teach people to run, they will simply do it.

 

Once again, teaching them to hide is also not great advice. In any dangerous situation including an active shooter scenario, it is human nature to attempt to hide if people are unable to run.  They do not need to be told to hide. If we examine active shooting incidents, it becomes obvious that hiding is not the best countermeasure. From the Columbine shooting, to the Virginia Tech shooting, students attempted to hide. As a result, they were easy targets and sitting ducks for the gunman.

 

In the Virginia Tech shooting, 30 students were killed and 17 wounded.  The high body count was due in large part, or totality, to the run and hide strategy. Hiding makes you highly vulnerable. Physically, you are immobile and defenseless. Mentally you are in a passive position of fear. Hiding without having the skills needed to fight an active shooter is worthless and dangerous advice.

 

 Too many training methods, including our governments, do little more than teach the hiding method, and have the people wait for law enforcement to arrive. In most active shooter incidents it can take the police 10 to 15 minutes to arrive at the scene. The active shooter on average kills about 4 to 5 people per minute. Do the math. Now you know why the the body counts are so high. Is hiding really a good strategy?

 

After running and hiding has failed, the government tells you to fight.  The government, however, does not teach you how to fight. They tell you to use improvised weapons. Well throwing a book or a shoe at an angry crazed out shooter wielding a shotgun or a rifle, just might make him shoot you. My advice is not to take a chalk board eraser or a fire extinguisher to a gun fight.

 

The same government that has turned so many Americans into passive wimps, seems to be oblivious to the fact that not only do sheep not know how to fight, they do not have the intestinal fortitude to stand up to flying bullets.

 

Unless you have a sheepdog mentality, and you have been trained, you will typically not be very effective going up against and armed shooter. In a stressful emergency, you will sink to your lowest level of training. If a person was unable to defend themselves in a schoolyard fist fight, what makes the government think they can defend themselves against an active shooter with a shotgun or an AK 47 assault rifle?

 

The government does not seem to understand or take into account the temperament of the average person. When placed in a dangerous situation, many people do little more than panic. They will either run frantically or freeze like a deer caught in headlights and become frozen in a state of inaction. I have found that proper self defense training can help counter the trampling stampede or that panicked state of inaction. Like I said, people will sink to their lowest level of training. Or lack there of.

 

In my program, once you learn situational awareness, combat mindset, and other basic self defense concepts, learning how to defend against an active shooter is simply an extension of the skills you have already learned.

 

Defensive skills are like building blocks, they have fundamental foundations. The basic skills, once mastered can be developed into a strategy to counter an active shooter. Our Active Shooter Training Program is an advanced course that builds upon our basic self defense system and combative firearm training courses.  That's what Extreme Combat is all about!

 

One of the best offenses against an active shooter with a gun, is a competent, trained good guy with a gun! If we had more law abiding citizens who were trained Extreme Combat Warriors, any active shooter would be taken out of the game in a matter of seconds. Unfortunately, our government does not trust citizens with guns.

 

My training program teaches a complete system of self defense, including H2H (hand to hand) techniques, nonlethal weapons, edged weapons, and firearms. It also teaches tactics and strategies to counter an active shooter. The skills needed in and active shooter scenario are built upon the same skills needed in any self defense situation. All of these skills are taught in Extreme Combat.

 

For the average citizen, in an active shooter situation, because they are unwilling to train, if possible, they should run. If they are unable to run, they should attempt to hide. Because they do not know how to fight, what else can they realistically do? For those who are trained in Extreme Combat, I would hope you would assist others. You can help evacuate the sheep, or help them hide behind cover. But most importantly, in all situations, I expect that any Extreme Combat Warrior would be ready, willing, and able to competently fight.

 

I recommend that schools, businesses, malls, and other public facilities, have on the premises qualified armed citizens or law enforcement officers who are trained how to react to an active shooter incident.

 

Gun Free Zones

 

Gun free zones are the among the most dangerous place on earth to be. Gun free zones are little more than advertisements to demented active shooters that their victims will be unarmed and easy prey. In gun free zones the only person will a gun is the active shooter criminal. As so often stated, to stop a bad guy with a gun takes a good guy with a gun.

 

School Defense Programs

 

"The average duration of Active Shooter incidents in Institutions of Higher Education within the United States is 12.5 minutes. In contrast, the average response time for campus and local law enforcement to these incidents is 18 minutes. In the majority of Active Shooter incidents affecting U.S. IHEs [Institution of Higher Education], the emergency response time greatly exceeds the incident duration and affords law enforcement authorities no opportunity to interdict the shooter or prevent further casualties." Department of Homeland Security

 

I believe, if the parents of school children were fully informed and cognizant of the lack of security and the outdated training method used to protect their children, they would be outraged. More time, money, and energy is spent protecting judges in courtroom facilities than is spent protecting their children from a potential active shooter incident. In essence, our children are literally unprotected. There is nothing in place to stop an active shooter.

 

The lack of precautions indicates a high level of ineptness on the part of our government and higher education officials. All they are doing is relying on the probability that an Active Shooter incident is highly remote. But what if it happens at a school your child is attending?

 

I place a heavy blame for the lack of protection at schools on the bureaucrats and government bungling, as well as the proponents of anti-gun policies. These people have stripped away the right for your children to be defended and protected. It is almost as if they wanted an active shooter incident so they can say "guns are at fault, lets take them away." In fact, blaming guns and attempting to ban guns, is about the only action or solution they take. What about protecting the children using armed guards? I believe parents should be outraged and should demand more out of the lame administrators.

 

The following quote is from a thesis published by the Department of Homeland Security and highlights the ineptness of and fumbling by government officials. Their conclusions in regards to preventing a shooting are as follows: "The preceding arguments have effectively summarized the official recommendations put forth by the Department of Education, Department of Justice, U.S. Secret Service, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Critical Incident Response Group, and the National Center for the Analysis of Violent Crime. However, none of these organizations can guarantee with any considerable fidelity that their recommendations will be able to effectively prevent or preempt an Active Shooter attack. This unfortunate conclusion has been confirmed throughout the United States on countless IHE campuses." Duh! How many millions of dollars did it take for them to come to this worthless conclusion?

 

Another quote from the Homeland Security Thesis confirms what I have been advocating for years. "In a collaborative effort entitled Active Shooter: How to Respond; DHS, along with NTOA and the Fairfax County Police Department, identified preparedness and response of Potential Victims as the most effective means to reduce the Rate of Kill in Active Shooter scenarios." What the Department of Homeland Security is saying, and advocating, is that increasing the preparedness and the response capability of the students or other victims is the most effective way to reduce the rate of kill. That means the safety of students, your children, lies in their own hands. They must have the means and ability to either stop or delay an active shooter until law enforcement arrives.

 

Nowhere does the Department of Homeland Security show how a student or other victim of a active shooter incident can be effectively prepared or respond to the attack. Until governmental agencies get their act together, and start funding more effective safety measures and procedures, your children will remain unprotected, sitting ducks for any active shooter.

 

My recommendation to parents and other citizens is to learn the self defense methods I teach in Extreme Combat. These methods need to be taught to your whole family, including your children. The mental and physical training methods that I teach will help prepare you and your family for many dangerous emergency situations; including an active shooter scenario.