Appendix followup

[Jay Cunningham]

Sorry - recovery can be a long process.

[JustOneGun]

To address some of the point above:

You do not have a 100% chance of shooting yourself. That would mean that you will shoot yourself. Pretty ridiculous. If that is true for you, please don't carry a gun. Or, if you're not a good person please, carry a gun.

I obviously don't agree with not using a holster, and neither does my FI friend with that agency. Be that as it may, those cops have not shot themselves. That doens't mean that we should copy what they do, but it does show that even a worst case scenario "carry setup" is very unlikely to result in an injury. The further you get from Mexican carry, the better off you should be.

As far as living on borrowed time, that is one way to look at it. I don't in any way condone what they are doing. However, to restate what I and others have said before, when that many people carry appendix, in so many different ways, with a lot of different skill levels represented, over that many years, and none of them have shot themselves, I would call that a clue. Appendix is not as dangerous as some would have you believe.

BTW, if 75% of that agency is carrying appendix in one form or another, we're talking about 27,000 people. Not an insignificant number. To push the point a little further, I would bet that none of them carry appendix exclusively. And as poorly as they shoot as an agency, they have never lost a gunfight, on or off duty, that I am aware of.

While I agree with your basic argument I worry about using stats such as this to support it. Using your logic, officers for decades have use that exact same argument as to why they don't need to sweat the small stuff. They pass the qual, they shoot fine, they will win the gunfight. I can usually find a memorial wall of some sort in every town and talk about how some of them died. The problem with loosing gunfights and dead people is that we don't know what small things came to be a factor. Dead men tell no tales. We can only learn from those that survived the gunfight and talked about what worked, what didn't and why. I don't think you were trying to say that but the same logic holds.

[SLG]

While I agree with your basic argument I worry about using stats such as this to support it. Using your logic, officers for decades have use that exact same argument as to why they don't need to sweat the small stuff. They pass the qual, they shoot fine, they will win the gunfight. I can usually find a memorial wall of some sort in every town and talk about how some of them died. The problem with loosing gunfights and dead people is that we don't know what small things came to be a factor. Dead men tell no tales. We can only learn from those that survived the gunfight and talked about what worked, what didn't and why. I don't think you were trying to say that but the same logic holds.

I agree with you completely. My only point with that was that if they can get away with this situation for as long as they have, doing things as poorly as they do them, then the prospect of carrying appendix can't be quite as inherently dangerous as some would have you believe. For the rest of us that take multiple precautions to avoid an ND, things are quite a bit better.

[NickA]

This thread, along with all the Beretta threads lately, is making it hard to suppress my inner Martin Riggs :-)

[HCM]

Mexican appendix carry used to be popular with DA revolvers - I recall many old school coppers using either the soft suede metal clip IWB holsters or a big wad of rubber bands on the upper part of the grip behind the trigger guard to keep the gun from slipping down their pants. Like this:

[JustOneGun]

I agree with you completely. My only point with that was that if they can get away with this situation for as long as they have, doing things as poorly as they do them, then the prospect of carrying appendix can't be quite as inherently dangerous as some would have you believe. For the rest of us that take multiple precautions to avoid an ND, things are quite a bit better.

I understand and agree.

It is amazing to me that the recent threads about this make it seem that it's okay to shoot yourself in the hip but not the crotch. Or put another way many seem to morph the argument that it is worse to shoot yourself in the crotch into the how you will shoot yourself in the crotch is different from the way you will shoot yourself in the hip. When I see that kind of attitude I fully believe that someone who carries appendix and understands the consequences is actually safer than those with that attitude carrying on the hip.

I mentioned my logic point in the first post not because I thought you were making the argument but because the idea of carrying in multiple locations is considered okay for the same reason. People believe they can overcome the problem or somehow win the gunfight anyway. To me that seems odd when a person can just pick a way to carry a gun and work on having one fantastic draw. Perhaps I'm wrong there but it just doesn't seem to make sense. If we can pick a system of self defense that avoids these types of problems then why not do that instead of believing that we will somehow overcome the obstacle that we have artificially placed for ourselves?

[JM Campbell]

I understand and agree.

It is amazing to me that the recent threads about this make it seem that it's okay to shoot yourself in the hip but not the crotch. Or put another way many seem to morph the argument that it is worse to shoot yourself in the crotch into the how you will shoot yourself in the crotch is different from the way you will shoot yourself in the hip. When I see that kind of attitude I fully believe that someone who carries appendix and understands the consequences is actually safer than those with that attitude carrying on the hip.

I mentioned my logic point in the first post not because I thought you were making the argument but because the idea of carrying in multiple locations is considered okay for the same reason. People believe they can overcome the problem or somehow win the gunfight anyway. To me that seems odd when a person can just pick a way to carry a gun and work on having one fantastic draw. Perhaps I'm wrong there but it just doesn't seem to make sense. If we can pick a system of self defense that avoids these types of problems then why not do that instead of believing that we will somehow overcome the obstacle that we have artificially placed for ourselves?

Well this is what I was trying to convey in a tounge and cheek way.

Back to knuckle dragging.

[LittleLebowski]

Pat Rogers once gave me a fascinating talk on the history of AIWB in the NYPD. I really need to turn that into an article/interview. Net/net, Pat's history supports Simon's assertion that many LEOs have done this in a fashion nowhere near as safe as this forum's membership and lived to tell the tale.

[LOKNLOD]

I purchased a G19 clone airsoft gun for my first AMIS class. It is a great rendition of a Gen 4 Glock, except some dimension is off and it won't work with Glock holsters (I immediately tried to jam it into my SME and am now in line for the English monarchy having successfully pulled it out). Because of that, I just ran with it Mexican carry all weekend. I never had an issue even jamming it in and out of my britches with no holster in the dark while juggling the flashlight. I have absolutely no interest in tempting fate purposefully by doing it with a live gun, but I will admit it did increase my comfort level with AIWB under normal conditions and with my normal gear and safety protocol.

I do wonder if, in some ways, a holster actually increases the likelihood of an AD during reholster. With no holster, if the trigger encounters "debris", it is a matter of trigger weight vs. debris rigidity. If you have a stiff holster mouth, it creates a great deal of mechanical advantage that could enable some folded t-shirt to pull the trigger.

[HCM]

Pat Rogers once gave me a fascinating talk on the history of AIWB in the NYPD. I really need to turn that into an article/interview. Net/net, Pat's history supports Simon's assertion that many LEOs have done this in a fashion nowhere near as safe as this forum's membership and lived to tell the tale.

The 12 lb NY plus "staple gun" trigger in the NYPD Glocks may help a bit.