Shot Placement?

[stephen426]

I believe that most people would shoot for the center of mass and follow up with a head shot if necessary. What do you guys think of pelvic shots? If you smash a guy's hip, you will pretty much stop him from advancing. There is also a great chance of hitting the femoral artery which will lead to massive bleeding (I believe death by bleeding out in well under 5 minutes). I think it is much easier to make the pelvic shot since it is still somewhat part of the center of mass. With head shots, you are dealing with a much smaller target. There is also a greater chance of deflection with the lesser powered calibers. Any thoughts?

[JohnKSa]

There was a very long thread on this awhile back.

http://www.thefiringline.com/forums/...d.php?t=158179

[stephen426]

Incredible... 3 pages of posts and no definitive answers. I hope this thread doesn't turn out the same way.

I carry a 9mm so even though multiple shots to the chest will eventually kill a person, it may not stop them quickly. I know nailing the spinal cord will incapacitate a person but that is not a very wide target, even with hollowpoints.

Oh well, I hope this type of knowledge never comes in handy. I guess I'll have to wing it if it comes down to it. Left nut sounds like a good start. God knows even getting flicked in the nads hurts like hell.

[armedandsafe]

A pelvic shot is good, if you get good placement. Break the pelvis, or a hip socket or a thigh bone and most people will not remain standing. I teach to focus on the abdomen, as almost everybody will shoot high in one-on-one combat. It is instinctive to focus on the perp's eyes or hands. However, remember that you will shoot closer to where you are FOCUSED than on where you think you are aiming.

There is a whole theory and practice related to this, called point-shooting. If you are interested, I have a little game which will surprise you. It involves 7 yard shooting and is a lot of fun, but takes some practice to get good at it.

Pops

[JohnKSa]

stephen,

Incapacitation (as by breaking or damaging the pelvis or leg) MAY prevent a person from walking, but probably not from shooting.

There are a few definitive answers.

One definitive answer is that in the vast majority of effective self-defense gun uses, the gun is either not fired, or it is fired but the attacker is not shot.

So, if you lose the lottery and have to pull your gun on someone, chances are you won't have to actually perforate him to get a good result.

If you actually shoot your attacker then you get into another probabilistic situation.

A person will ONLY be INSTANTLY neutralized by a shot if one or more of the following occurs.

1. The person is mentally or psychologically predisposed to fall down upon being shot.

2. The actual event of being shot completely re-arranges the person's priorities.

3. The shot damages the Central Nervous System (CNS=Upper spine and brain).

1 & 2 are actually pretty common.

#3 is the hard one, but fortunately it's not likely that you'll actually have to rely on your ability to make such a shot except in the most dire circumstances. Most attackers give up before being shot, most of the rest of them give up after being shot (even with bad shot placement). It's only the real die hards that must be actually neutralized by bullet placement.

If you can't or don't make the CNS hit and you're faced with a "die hard" then it comes down to making them lose consciousness (or die) of blood pressure drop to the brain. That will require a complete bleed out (which could take from seconds to hours), severe damage to the heart, or severe damage to the large blood vessels in the neck. Physically incapacitating the attacker (as with a pelvis shot) can't hurt at this point, as long as it doesn't interfere with your other goals.

[utaherrn]

such as a heart shot, damage to the aorta (main artery coming from the heart, branches off in the pelvis into the right and left femoral arteries), the vena cava (main vein bringing blood back to the heart), etc.
Disrupt blood flow to the brain, and the CNS shuts down. It is not as rapid however as a brain or high spine wound would be.

A pelvis wound can be a good incapacitator, especially if the BG has body armor.

[mete]

Those who have been there say that a pelvic shot usually drops the BG immediately.There was an excellent thread about this on another forum.

[Double Naught Spy]

mete, those who have been there and done that will also tell you that most shots to the gut and chest will usually drop people as well, sooner or later, temporarily or permanently. What those peole who have been there can't tell you, usually, is just exactly why the person went down when shot in the low abdomen. Was it because of getting shot and being in a lot of pain, or is it because they have had a structural collapse of the pelvis due to a break? Lots of people shot in the "pelvis" are either not actually hit in the pelvis, or not hit in an area that is going to cause a structural collapse.

As noted by armedandsafe, the shots need to be fairly precise in order to get the desired result. Given that most shooters have such a poor understanding of anatomy and biomechanics, for them to effect a pelvic stop shot that 'breaks' the pelvis is going to be more about randon chance than skill and marksmanship. On top of that, the vast majority of the pelvis can suffer damage without causing locomoter breakdown.

On a clothed person, male or female, do you know what landmarks you need to be able to identify in order to hit the precise areas in order to cause a pelvic break that will preclude locomotion? Probably not.

When I took my first handgun defense class, I was instructed where to shoot so that I would hit and break the pelvis. The moron instructor provided incorrect information. I have seen this sort of information repeated by other instructors and I had to upgrade my assessment from moron to ignorant. Simply put, most don't have a clear enough understanding of the topic to actually be able to explain properly where to shoot and how the shot will affect the pelvis.

I was told to reach down and feel the bone underneath my pants front pockets. I was told that what I was feeling was the pelvis and that if I shot it, it would break and the person would collapse to the ground, unable to walk. What the instructors were having us locate was the pelvis, the iliac blade, actually. This is the largest portion of the pelvis, but one that holds the least amount of locomotor stress. Its big job is in acting like a bowl to support the lower muscles and organs. Unless it snaps in half or is damaged at the socket, this bone can take a lot of abuse without causing locomotor breakdown. You can puncture it, break of chunks (such as those areas you feel under your pants front pockets) and the person still be fully capable of locomotion. It would be painful, but so too would any ballistic wound.

Take this little anatomy lesson a little further. When old people fall and break their hips, do you know what has actually happened? Next time you get gun instuction for shooting the pelvis, ask your instructor to explain to you about what happens when old folks fall and break their hips. See if he gets the answer right. If he doesn't, don't put too much stock in his instruction on ballistically breaking the pelvis until you can verify his information.

What does happen? First, the sequence of events is wrong for most cases. Usually old folks break their hip and fall. It is associated most with older people due to osteoporosis, bone loss. Okay, so what is actually breaking? It will usually be one or both of two areas. The first is the breaking of the femoral neck, separating the head of the femor inside of the acetabulum (socket) from the shaft of the femur. The other break is going to be the acetabulum, either where the head of the femur punches through or where the side of the socket breaks free.

Pelvic shots can be good, but don't count on being able to hit the pelvis in such a way so as to cause the proverbial pelvic break that is so commonly mentioned in gun lore.

[OBIWAN]

Pelvic shots were originally "all the rage" as the best way to hit a major bone and therefore lessen the chance that a rifle round would punch right through like an icepick

Please note the following discussion of pelvic shots by Dr. Fackler in--Fackler ML: "Shots to the Pelvic Area ". Wound Ballistics Review. 4(1):13; 1999.

“I welcome the chance to refute the belief that the pelvic area is a reasonable target during a gunfight. I can find no evidence or valid rationale for intentionally targeting the pelvic area in a gunfight. The reasons against, however, are many. They include:

-- From the belt line to the top of the head, the areas most likely to rapidly incapacitate the person hit are concentrated in or near the midline. In the pelvis, however, the blood vessels are located to each side, having diverged from the midline, as the aorta and inferior vena cava divide at about the level of the navel. Additionally, the target that, when struck, is the most likely to cause rapid and reliable incapacitation, the spinal cord located in the midline of the abdomen, thorax and neck), ends well above the navel and 18 not a target in the pelvis.
-- The pelvic branches of the aorta and inferior vena cava are more difficult to hit than their parent vessels -- they are smaller targets, and they diverge laterally from the midline (getting farther from it as they descend). Even if hit, each carry far less blood than the larger vessels from which they originated. Thus, even if one of these branches in the pelvis is hit, incapacitation from blood loss must necessarily be slower than from a major vessel hit higher up in the torso.
-- Other than soft tissue structures not essential to continuing the gunfight (1oops of bowel, bladder) the most likely thing to be struck by shots to the pelvis would be bone. The ilium is a large flat bone that forms most of the back wall of the pelvis. The problem is that handgun bullets that hit it would not break the bone but only make a small hole in passing through it: this would do nothing to destroy bony support of the pelvic girdle. The pelvic girdle is essentially a circle: to disrupt its structure significantly would require breaking it in two places. Only a shot that disrupted the neck or upper portion of the shaft of the femur would be likely to disrupt bony support enough to cause the person hit to fall. This is a small and highly unlikely target: the aim point to hit it would be a mystery to those without medical training — and to most of those with medical training.

The “theory” stated in the question postulates that “certain autonomic responses the body undergoes during periods of stress” causes officers to shoot low, and that apparently this is good in a gunfight because such shots cause “severe disability.” I hope that the points presented above debunk the second part of the theory. As for the “autonomic responses” that cause officers to shoot low, I am unaware of anything in the anatomy or physiology of the autonomic nervous system that would even suggest such an occurrence. Most laymen do not understand the function of the autonomic nervous system. It is simply a system whose main function is to fine tune the glands and smooth muscles (those in the walls of organs and blood vessels) of the body. During times of stress such as perceived impending danger, the autonomic nervous system diverts blood from the intestines and digestive organs to the skeletal muscles — in the so-called “fight or flight” response. The effects of this response are constantly exaggerated by laymen who lack an adequate understanding of it — most notably by gun writ-ers eager to impress their readers. Interestingly, the human body can get along quite well without major parts of the autonomic nervous system. During my professional life as a surgeon, myself and colleagues removed parts of thousands of vagus nerves (mostly in treating peptic ulcer disease) -- thus depriving the patient of the major part of the parasympathetic half of the autonomic nervous system. We also removed many ganglia from the sympathetic half of the auto-nomic nervous system, in treating such things as profusely excess sweating and various problems caused by spasm of the arteries. I am unaware of any evidence that these operations produced any significant effect on the future capacity of these patients to react appropriately in times of impending danger.

[stephen426]

Wow! How's that for a rebuttal. Okay. Two in the chest and one in the head it is. Two questions remain however: is a DA more likely to try someone when a head shot is used and are the relatives of the deceased more likely to sue? I guess it doesn't matter though as most would rather be judged by 12 than carried by 6.

By the way, is it really that hard to make a good pelvic shot? I would say follow the line from a pair of normal cut priefs and shoot for the middle of the leg. That should hit the head of the femur and stop an attacker from advancing. I'm sure it will hurt like hell anyways. With prefragmented ammo, the fragments then have a greater chance of striking the femoral artery. Please correct me if I am wrong in my assunmptions.

[pamick]

Me? My first shots are going for the largest target; That being the chest. The head shot is secomd. If I pull, I shoot, when I shoot I'm not interested in wounding and/or disabling, I intend to kill.

[Dwight55]

I guess my answer would have to depend on a couple of things:

Have I gotten behind some cover and am now down on one knee and "shooting up" at the bg? In that case, . . . I'll probably zip him "up" by working my shot placement up as the gun recoils, . . . ultimately ending in a neck and then head shot, . . . if he stands that long.

That is the natural progression taking into account the recoil of the weapon, I just wouldn't quite recover 100% each shot.

On the other hand, . . . if he is down on one knee and I am standing, . . . I am going to start zipping him about mid ways of the leg having the knee on the ground, . . . in an attempt to unseat his strength of position.

Anyway, . . . that is plan 1, . . . plan 2 will be devised as I see plan 1 disintegrate

The only time I would conscientously consider a pelvic shot, . . . if i saw that the COM shots were not working (body armor), . . . hip and pelvic region also has some areas that can be "seriously" painful if slapped with a hanging piece of kevlar that just got whammied by a 230 gr. 1911 round. Might not take him out, . . . but should seriously double him up with some kind of pain.

May God bless,
Dwight

[JohnKSa]

Those who have been there say that a pelvic shot usually drops the BG immediately

See my post--a shot to ANY part of the body usually drops the BG immediately because he A) realizes he's been shot and thinks that's the proper reaction or B) he suddenly realizes that whatever he was doing is going to get him killed if he doesn't stop it immediately.

The question isn't whether shooting someone in the pelvis drops them immediately, it's whether shooting someone in the pelvis drops them more reliably than shooting them somewhere else.

[itgoesboom]

Talked to a friend about this last night. He is an ER doctor, and sees a fair amount of gun shot wounds.

We had a chat about the shooting 2 chest, one head, or 2 chest, on pelvis.

He told me in no uncertain terms to forget shooting the pelvis, unless I am using a rifle.

Heres basically what he said, in a non-medical way (cuz there is no way I could repeat the medical terms ).

In order to take the person down reliably with a pelvic shot, you will need to hit a spot on either side of the hips, and the target is about 1/2 the size of your fist, or smaller.

Miss that, and the person keeps on coming.

I will place more faith in my doctor friend than internet commandos.

I.G.B.

[Mannlicher]

Shooting for COM is done for reasons. Its the largest target, it contains a lot of stuff, that if messed up, slows your assailent down, and its at the natural level of sight that makes hitting that area more certain.

[PressCheck]

Three points:

1. The pelvic girdle is very small.
2. COM is large.
3. Even if the pelvic shot is successful, the BG could still have the gun in his hand.

[Double Naught Spy]

I will place more faith in my doctor friend than internet commandos.

Some of us internet commandos got it right, but you are wise to put faith into a person you trust. With that said, his sample of hip shots is probably fairly low, but the data are probably good and he has first hand knowledge of the injuries and results. What he probably does not have much knowledge on is when folks did or did not 'keep coming' or how far they were able to keep coming. A break may occur with locomotor stress at some point AFTER being damaged.

IGB, I am a little confused about what the half fist-sized spots are that need to be hit as per your doctor friend. You mentioned a spot on either side of the hips. "Hip" is a vague term and as noted here, often includes the pelvis, upper femur, and surrounding soft tissues. I am going to guess that the area your doctor is talking about is in the area of the acetabulum where the femur connects with the pelvis.

Even with a rifle, not all shots to the pelvis will preclude locomotion. The history channel showed skeletal remains from Little Big Horn where a guy had a .50+ caliber hole through the iliac blade. Aside from the hole, the pelvis was intact.

[itgoesboom]

DNS,

Wasn't specifically refrencing the people in this thread when I made the "internet commandos" comment.

Quite often people on the internet claim that a hip shot is the most effective and quickest way to stop a person. Those are the internet commandoes that I am referring to.

Anyways, as for exactly what part my friend was refrencing, I can't recall exactly what he called it (guiness might be to blame for that ) but it was "femoral something" I think. He did point out where it was, and made a rough gesture of the size, which looked to be about 1/2 the size of a fist or so.

I.G.B.

[Capt. Charlie]

Actually, I'm surprised that no one has mentioned the medical theories behind "tac tac", or multiple round hits. Several years ago, our Dept's range master delved into this and it quickly became the department standard. According to the theories, a single hit to all but instantly lethal areas causes the body to muster substantial defenses, especially adrenalin flow. However, several hits close together (time wise, that is), confuses the body's defenses, and they shut down. Shock quickly follows. So all of our combat range practice now includes quick, 2 round shots. And believe me, gentlemen (and ladies), when it suddenly hits the fan and you find yourself pulling your weapon in earnest, you won't think about it; you'll revert to the way you were trained. It's automatic. Poor training or little practice? You loose. Thus "tac tac" shooting on the range is a must, from the holster, from a barricade, from everywhere. We also train for a tac tac, plus one to the head if a vest is suspected, but the head is a very difficult target. Also, a round striking a vest makes a distinct sound, but unless you hear it all the time (hopefully nobody has), it doesn't register right away. Reacting in a shooting (or no shoot) situation is sort of like Pavlov's dogs, or pulling your hand away from a hot stove. Instinctive response based on training and practice.

[utaherrn]

your ER doc friend was probably referring to the femoral neck, the part of the femur that often breaks in little old ladies. It is the angled portion of the femur before it connects to the acetabulum, is the size described, and is a load bearing part of the "hip" joint. Take out the femoral neck and the person cannot stand. This is why little old ladies fall after their brittle bone fractures at this point.
Also, if you take out the "hip joint" itself, composed of the acetabulum (or "socket"), and femoral head (or "ball") of the ball and socket that comprose the hip, and that person cannot stand either.
Hit the femoral artery, and rapid exsanguination leads to unconsciousness (bleed out = pass out). Hows that for medical lingo?
I think that the point contended is whether or not a pelvic hit is a good stopper. The point is, it can be. But you gotta hit the right areas of the pelvis. Hit the load bearing areas, or plumbing and a pelvic hit can be effective. As effective as head, heart or spine? Probably not. Miss the "vitals" of the pelvis and it's much like a gut shot.
Just my 2 cents.

[OBIWAN]

"a shot to ANY part of the body usually drops the BG immediately"

Now that is a dangerous assumption

Try not to die of shock if/when a bad guy keeps coming

[w4klr]

If I hadn't emptied my magazine on him, I'd probably go for the pelvis... But also to say, drive enough lead to break lungs and aorta... that will stop him from shooting.

If I'm shooting, I'm shooting to kill... speculating where to shoot, considering adrenaline etc... may prove to be interesting for a small region like the pelvis... I say center body mass, head, chest, stomach. If you have hi-capacity 40 or 45, you sir.... are an assassin.

[itgoesboom]

utaherrn,

Thats it!!

Thats exactly what he had mentioned! The femoral neck (I think).

Anyways, as he mentioned to me, and like you said, if you could hit that spot and break the bone, the person goes down. Otherwise, well, you pay your money, you take your chances.

The thing that gets me is that it is a small target, and it is not exactly defined externally. It's not like people have a mark on their shorts showing where the femoral neck is.

So hitting a target that small, thats moving, and there is no indicator of where it is....well, thats a stretch.

I.G.B.

[Double Naught Spy]

Capt Charlie, your friend's tac tac theory sounds interesting, but doesn't seem to follow reality, at least not with pistol rounds. In many cases, multiple hits fail to register quickly in the bad guy's mind. Heck, he may not even realize he has been shot more than once. He may go into shock from blood loss, but in the time it may take for that to happen, he can still be fighting and killing.

I don't know the literature that says multiple impacts, close together in time, confuse the body and cause it to go into shock. I think your rangemaster is referring to hydrostatic shock, but that is something not likely to be accomplished with handgun ammo.

Your rangemaster's tac tac is called a double tap. Tac tac and one to the head is called a Mozambique or failure to stop drill. Do you know why it is called a failure to stop drill? Simple, if the first two shots have not dropped the guy, then more than likely more shots to the body are not going to produce the desired result any time soon. The guy may be walking dead, surviving on adrenaline, still fighting. Or, he may have on body armor. Either way, additional shots to the body aren't likely to get the immediate result desired, hence the follow-up of going to the head. Of course, by going to the head, it is necessary to get a CNS shot that does significant damage to the brain, brain stem, or upper spinal cord.

Do you think you can get your rangemaster to muster together the medical literature on how his tac tac creates shock.

[AttackTurtle]

According to books I have read, You should aim for the cardiovascular Triangle which is formed by Both nipples to the adam's apple. Body mass is too vague. The only time to aim for the head is if the BG is behind something and that is your only target or if he has body armor on. In that case, you want to shoot between the eyebrows down the the nose. Anything higher can hit the slope of the head and may skim off. Anything lower may pass through without hitting anything vital. If the BG is wearing body armor, it is suggested to shoot the head or the pelvis.