Stand and fire? or evade first?

[LASur5r]

Many of you have trained to draw and fire on an on rushing BG with a knife in hand. How many of you have trained to evade (sidestep first?) then draw and fire when you have a little more distance and time?

For those of you who have the training, which technique do you prefer and think is more effective?

[C.R.Sam]

Trained both ways. If high likelyhood of successfull evasion, evade and avoid. If not a nearly sure thing to avoid, STOP the bad guy. The longer you mess around the better chance you will be hurt by him.

To survive; you must either avoid or take the initiative from him and go on the offence. Then the one with the best combination of skills and tools will prevail.

Sam

[garrettwc]

Not sure if this is what you meant. I am practicing to simultaneously sidestep and draw and fire. I make the best of both options. Evade while still putting multiple rounds on the BG.

My groups doing this aren't "one ragged hole" but I can keep them all in the 8" A zone on IDPA silhouettes.

[David Blinder]

1st priority is to avoid injury to self (ie. going home with no leaks) so I firmly believe that moving off the line gets top billing. This also holds true regardless of whether it's a hand to hand, knife, or gun scenario.

[Jake 98c/11b]

I'm with Erick on this one, move and keep moving if possible.It makes you a harder target and might buy you some time as well. A fraction of a second could mean a lifetime.

[Double Naught Spy]

At a Rangemaster class held in Dallas, Dane Burns specifically talked about this scenario as did Tom Givens. While no class that I have taken has suggested standing still in a one-on-one encounter in open terrain such as a parkinglot, the Rangemaster folks specifically suggested not to retreat, but to step aside. The reasoning given was bizarre. You see, you can't run or retreat as fast backwards as the guy who is charging you. Of course that is true. So, you just side step and he will run right by you because he can't turn quickly. I had the mental image of Roadrunner sidestepping at the last possible moment as Wylie Coyote went running by and off the cliff....Well, unless you side step at the very last moment, he can turn quickly enough or simply extend the knife out to the side.

Think about people tackling in football. The tackler is most likely to miss if the runner changes course at the last possible second so that the tackler has already committed to the final thrust. If the runner changes direction too early, it is not a problem for the tackler. So in the charging bad guy scenario, the real question becomes whether or not you have the balls to stand still long enough to let the bad guy get completely committed to that line of attack before you try sidestepping. If you don't know, go find some guy faster than you and have him charge you and see if he can't get his hands on your fairly quickly. See how long you can wait before moving. It is a good drill to practice, if not to just show you how quickly things can happen and how quickly things can go wrong or get better.

Stepping aside is better than standing still, but it does not buy you much in the way of addtional time, time that you may need to actually be able to draw and fire your gun.

Retreating will not let you out run the guy, but it will buy more time to draw and fire before he reaches you.

Retreating alone may not be enough, but it is better than just sidestepping and maybe a combination might be good. Either way, don't be fooled into thinking the bad guy won't or can't compensate for your actions. I thought that comment from Rangemaster was completely unreasonable as the bad guy certainly may be able to compensate.

If you do side step, then it isn't just one step, you have to keep moving away.

Making the bad guy react to you is fine, but it doesn't do you any good if you make him react to you in a manner he can deal with.

Remember that the greater the distance, the more time you have. For a bad guy with a knife, the knife has limited range so distance is definitely your friend when you have a gun.

With either side stepping (and continuing to do so) or retreating, it is important that you be situationally aware of what is around you. You can't sidestep very far if trapped between cars in a parking lot or in a long hallway. You can't retreat if your back is already against the wall. You need to be aware of the type of terrain you are on. Are you on level ground? Are you in a level parkinglot with painted stripes or one full of pot holes and those cement parking bumps? Whatever course of action you choose will be largely negated if you fall to the ground.

[Jeff White]

We made a charging target to train this scenario with. I prefer the move and shoot simultaniously drill. Moving to the side is preferable as it forces the assailant to change direection, slowing him down.

Of course you have to be aware of your surroundings. You may not be able to move sideways. We've also trained a variation with your hands full as if you were attacked on the PD parking lot while loading or unloading the squad at the beginning or end of a shift.

This is a variation that private citizens should train on as well. You might be attacked in the mall parking lot while you have your hands full of shopping bags etc.

If anyone wants instructions on how I made the charging target shoot me an e-mail.

Jeff

[Mannlicher]

I wish I had time, and opportunity to do some of the training you are speaking of. The chance of my needing to confront a BG with a knife is pretty remote, all things considered. My training , that I do myself, will continue to consist of decision making, and reaction by presenting my weapon and firing. If push ever comes to shove , so to speak, I hope this is going to prove adequate..

[Double Naught Spy]

Let's face it, there is little chance any of us will be charged bya person with a knife at a significant distance, such as the Tueller distance of 21 feet. Real quickly, a guy with a knife can reach you in the 1.5+ seconds it takes you to react and draw. Tueller, the law officer in the case where that happened was found justified in shooting a guy with a knife at that distance because that guy was in fact a lethal threat at that range. If the guy wants to mug you, he is going to be up close and personal, maybe within 5-10 feet before flashing the knife and announcing he will kill you.

As Mannlicher pointed out, decision making is important, but proper decision making really is based on situational awareness. Many potential confrontations are stopped simply by not letting yourself be put in a position where someone can take advantage of you.

By the way, we worked the Tueller drill using an ASP red gun for the good guy and a 12" blunt wood paint stirrer as the knife of the bad guy. We are a motley group in terms of being terribly speedy runners, but have decent gun skills. At 21 feet, almost everyone would have been able to shoot a charging attacker, if just from a hip shot if everything went right with a clean draw, not caught up in a shirt or cover garment. At most, nobody moved more than about 5 feet, even with changing direction. The drill was not to illustrate retreating, but to illustrate that how dangerous a person could be even at that distance and with a knife. Assuming that none of the shots produced total nervous system shutdown, every person in the test would have been stabbed by the attacker. What is significant here is that they knew they were going to be charged and so the decision to react had already been made. Reaction time would have increased dramatically if they would not have known they were going to be attacked and just looked up and saw someone charging them. It is fine to feel good about the fact that you could shoot an attacker charging you with a knife, but that isn't good enough. The trick is not to shoot the guy, but to not get stabbed!

Retreating and side stepping can all work much better than standing still with a good shooting platform. Being situationally aware before the attack starts is going to be critical in such a situation and that may be what is most necessary about staying out of trouble.

By the way, if shopping and carrying bags out to your car, never carry with both hands full. Always have a free hand, preferably your gun hand. If you have too much stuff, get a cart. Carts make nice barriers as well for someone who is charging against you. It may not stop them, but will slow them down.

[ninenot]

Not being a defense expert, you may take this for what it's worth: were I trying to ste out of the line, I would step to the knife-carrier's weak side; thus, if he wants to cut you he must cross his body to do it. At least the cut won't be too deep....

[boris_01]

All have made good points. In training in boxing, kickboxing, judo, jujitsu I naturally work in angles. Avoiding straight forward linear approachs. But even with this being so. If the BG is rushing with a knife as was stated in the original post, side step or not makes little difference. He should be shot before he reachs you. If he is up close to you, then worry about side stepping. If he is shot and still advances, again side step at that time. But once you see the knife and he steps toward you, shoot.

[yorec]

I'm another who practices the draw and side step simultaneously.

As has been pointed out, it is likely that a knife wielder will only make it known that he intends to cut you at distances closer than twenty one feet. Then it is essential to get yourself moving away form him for more reasons than just to gain distance - if he's that close, you're probably going to get cut. Period. Plan on it and move in such a way (right angle away from attacker) that he is less likely to get in a lethal or crippling blow. And return the favor with several rounds of your favorite defense ammo to finish the fight. When he is down and no longer a threat, tend to your wounds and hope they aren't too bad...

Facing a knife isn't a pretty affair.

[Azrael256]

There's a pretty good video called "Surviving Edged Weapons" that is certainly worth the 45 minutes. It deals with all the ideas discussed here, and even talks about the unexpected edged weapons, like broken glass. It's done mainly for police, but the lessons still apply to everyone. The basic idea is to always sidestep, and to try to put something in between you and the attacker that cannot easily be stepped over, like the rather common police practice of standing behind the fender of the squad car. It also deals with disarming/disabling an attacker. There's a rather amusing scene in which an officer pulls over a man who then pulls a knife. The officer is standing a good distance away behind his car door, and he whips out his telescoping baton (don't recall what those are called) without blinking. The man drops the knife (swiss army knife at that) and says "jeez, I was just kidding!".

[Rickmeister]

Many of you have trained to draw and fire on an on rushing BG with a knife in hand. How many of you have trained to evade (sidestep first?) then draw and fire when you have a little more distance and time?

Easier asked than answered.

Survival hinges on reflexive training, of course. And although CHL trainees are smothered with "avoidance", "de-escalation", and "conflict resolution" techniques, the truth of the matter is: there is a very fine line between the ability to run and the need to fight. And within that line there is an even finer one: between one's ability to de-escalate and one's obvious need to stop the assailant dead in his tracks (e.g., do I pull my gun out and hope that he backs off---at seven yards or less---when he sees it, or do I immediately open fire?).

Train frequently to recognize the most likely outcome of every situation that comes to mind---with an emphasis on BGs means, motive and opportunity. Then leave it up to your reflexes.

[trapshooter]

opened the door to another point that needs to be made. What is your objective? The police officer has a different result in mind than does the average citizen, i.e. arrest. The citizen is mainly interested in surviving the encounter (although detention/arrest of the BG may become the objective, depending on circumstances).

Of course, both the cop and the citizen want to survive. I'm trying to outline a difference in philosophy. The cop is thinking survival, but will (should) always be looking to end up with the BG in custody. The citizen also thinks of survival, but may or may not be considering what happens after that.

No problem, in either case, survival is the first objective. Whether or not the citizen ends up being able to hand the BG over to the police is secondary to the objective, not a part of it. Police response and citizen response to an assault with a deadly weapon are the same, except that, in some states at least, the citizen (with CCW) has an obligation to retreat, if possible. Check the Florida CCW laws for an example. This obligation to retreat makes the situation more difficult for the citizen than for the cop. It adds a layer of decision-making to the tactical problem, and thus tends to slow down responses.

The range between the attacker and the defender thus becomes more important to the citizen. He has to know whether or not retreat is an option. Shorter ranges tend to reduce the viability of retreat. Surprise is another factor that would reduce one's ability to retreat.

Short of playing 'what if', (which I don't like to do), the one thing that will help is training, which has already been stressed here. I obviously agree with this. And for the citizen, would go farther, and include situational training to illustrate specific points of local law regarding such encounters. This should show why I don't like to play 'what if', as each state is different, and I certainly do not have the specific knowledge to render a valid opinion.

One thing that is fairly constant is the fact that, if a citizen is threatened with deadly force, AND fears for (his/her) life or the life of another in the IMMEDIATE sense, then at least a reasonable, affirmative defense of one's actions can be made regarding the use of deadly force as a legitimate response. (BTW, in Florida, you have no duty to retreat from your home).

I know this doesn't answer any specific questions, but this point is important, and needs to be dealt with. Preferable, before one ends up in court. You need to know what the ramifications of your actions may be, and conduct yourself, (and train) accordingly.

[fix]

LE, Military, Civillian...it doesn't matter. #1 priority is avoiding injury to yourself and other friendlies. #2 is stop the bad guy by using an appropriate level of force. It's a judgement call. Training will help in this type of sitch...but experience is a big plus. If your wife and children (or fireteam/partner) are 2 feet behind you draw and fire while screaming for them to evade. If you're alone and the opportunity presents itself, evade first. Too many variables to give a solid answer on this one.

[Covert Mission]

mannlicher:

The chance of my needing to confront a BG with a knife is pretty remote, all things considered.

Maybe not. A knife is a very common and concealable weapon, and many bad guys carry them all the time. Moving off the center line, even if the assailant isn't sprinting at you, is a good idea, even in CQB distances. It throws the bad guy's plan off, and he then has to react to your action, while you draw and fire (or run, or OC him). As someone said here, moving to the weak side of the BG, so that he has to turn or cross his body to get to you, is good too imo.

[shy_man]

I am so allergic to see a BG having knife. I think, if I am assaulted by one, I will not evade anymore but instead stop him by shooting at the legs or perhaps to the body depending on how deadly the threat is.

thanks

[Hard Ball]

Take an angled step as you draw and fire. Draw and fire using your strong hand only. Keep youe weak hand ready to block. Do NOT "shoot-look-shoot.' Fire as rapidly as you can press the trigger until your attacker goes down.

[D.W. Drang]

Being barely coordinated enough to draw and shoot, hopefully fast enough to actually survive, I'm not about to start worrying about any fancy footwork.
You ballroom dancers can try and imitate Jacky Chan all you want, though.

[Quartus]

This is a variation that private citizens should train on as well. You might be attacked in the mall parking lot while you

both the cop and the citizen

LE, Military, Civillian...it doesn't matter

It does matter, and not only in threads that are explicitly discussing civil liberties.

There are only two categories; civilian and military. LEOs are civilians.

The mindset expressed (unintentionally, I'm quite sure) in the above posts is a threat to your freedom.


mannlicher, if you are interested in some excellent defensive firearms training in the sub $500 category, check out http://www.thefiringline.com/forums/...threadid=98220

[Quartus]

Yes, Erick, it's one thing to say that some things don't apply if one is not in the police business. Quite correct. That is a distinction between job requiremnts. Most folks don't need to know much about RF safety, but it does apply in my field.

But the distinction between LEOs and civilian is NOT valid - in fact is dangerous. And that point needs to be made and made and made again. BATF, Secret Service, FBI, local deputy - all are civilians.

[trapshooter]

But the distinction between LEOs and civilian is NOT valid - in fact is dangerous. And that point needs to be made and made and made again. BATF, Secret Service, FBI, local deputy - all are civilians.

If you go back and read my post, note that I referred to 'the average citizen' as opposed to 'cops' (meaning any law enforcement type). In 'use of deadly force' issues this IS a valid and important distinction, as police WILL get different treatment in court, both criminal and civil. Yes, they are all 'civilians', but courts look upon 'trained' police very differently than they do 'untrained' civilians. That is the context in which I said what I did. It is a simple fact that 'police' have different obligations regarding the law, (especially after the fact of an encounter), than the rest of us do. In this sense, most military personnel would be 'citizens', as well.

Hope this clears up some apparent confusion in semantics.

[jcoiii]

My step-father is a police officer of over 20 years experience. During his yearly training (and perhaps more often), each officer is tested in their reaction time and ability to respond in a knife situation. As I recall now, I believe this is a common exercise for him and his fellow officers. I believe the distance at which the attacker starts is 6 yards. The drill involves the attacker running at the officer as the officer attempts to back away/avoid and draw/shoot the attacker. My step-father has been in his present location for over 15 years, doing this each year. He said that in his entire time training in this particular exercise, no officer has been able to draw and shoot the attacker successfully without first being "stabbed" by the rubber knife. And these are not below average officers. They are top rate. My step dad has never been able to defend himself, and he is a Sgt. now. Though he always wins as the attacker
All that to say that an attacker with an knife taking you by surprise even at a fairly decent distance, has an incredible advantage. My personal choice would be move out of the dang way. Or learn some hand to hand and maybe take one in the arm as you remove the assailant's eyes without anesthesia.

[Quartus]

Gotcha, trapshooter. Valid distinction in job description, and therefore in the likelyhood of various types of encounters.