Quote:
|
The "hip bone" is something of an unscientific descriptor used to describe the iliac blade or the lateral aspect of the proximal end of the femur.
|
"Hip", as I used it was meant to refer to a general anatomical region, not a particular skeletal structure. No such thing as a "hip bone" as you pointed out.
Quote:
|
If the round is large or fast enough to shatter the pelvis or break its structural integrity, then the person can physically not stand or walk/run. If it doesn't shatter it, and simply punctures it or ricochets off of it thus transversing the pelvic region, the wound has probable chance to be painful enough to prevent standing or movement.
|
This was the key phrase that I've been operating under. Considering ballistics here, there are quite a few rounds with the energy to accomplish this task when you include rifles, pistols, and rocket-propelled grenades. When speaking on handgun rounds; this being a handgun forum and all, you could be speaking of a .22lr or a .44mag: which is where understanding and arguing the philosophy, or metaphysics (physics and biology are implied), of the situation really comes to the forefront. You don't want to attempt a structurally or functionally disabling shot with a round that doesn't have the capacity to accomplish the intended task: Obviously.
But speaking from experience of an avulsion fracture on my left pelvis during my teen years, even when not structurally disabling, a pelvic wound can still be functionally incapacitory, as I noted above. The majority of your bodily weight resides above your waistline. Any other limb wound isn't nearly as debilitating. Even a leg wound can be helped by "taking your weight off of it". Not a solution, but an assisted state no less. If you're left hip has been fractured, even with all of your weight on your right leg, your upper body is still bearing down on your pelvis, exacerbated by the pelvic rotation required to shift weight to one leg and move. It is incredibly painful. Even if one could move, they won't be moving quickly. And they truly won't get very far.
So, in conclusion, you are still better off shooting COM and will almost certainly end most any encounter more effectively with that tactic. This is really nothing more than a situational tactic, though an effective one if employed efficiently. Unless you're a marksman with a .308 rifle, I'd tend to leave it alone. The training required to be able to employ it effectively and the likelihood of you having to use those skills rate quite low on the Scale of Cost-Benefit Ratio.
~LT