Some thoughts in support of up close while waiting for that to download:
Today on the way to lunch I heard footsteps coming up fast behind me, it was a tall skinny tweaker and he was running pretty much right at me. Several things then happened in very rapid succession:
- I knew immediately there wasn't going to be time to get turned all the way to face him. The half-conscious plan was to hit him hard with an elbow in the face, which I was perfectly positioned to do. it would have needed to count though, because after that it was going to take a second to get planted and balanced;
- about a millisecond after that I knew he wasn't coming after me, he was just running maybe because he was wired or maybe he was late for the bus, who knows, and his path just happened to be about one foot off my path;
- and then a fraction of a second after that, about the time he got five feet from me, he picked up on my body language (or something), stopped cold, half circled around me, and then once clear started running again. When last seen he was four blocks away.
can't personally speak to LE incidents, but the generic lesson was that things can happen very quickly, and there was no way I was even going to get my hand on my J-frame in time, if this had been real and if he had a weapon.
I'd give you an A for that one, mate.
Recognized a potential threat, made a hasty plan, didn't press the "go" button when it wasn't warranted. We should all do so well.
I was into 10mm Auto before it sold out and went mainstream, but these days I'm here for the revolver and epidemiology information.
Most violent crime (and therefore, most defenses) occur in public, not at home. This is why pistol skills should take priority over things like carbine training.
Good data and good point, esp for those of us (civilians) who tend to prioritize carbine training. From the report:
"Firearms were used in 13,111 (92.3%) of all justifiable homicides, of which 10,565 (74.4%) were handguns."