In another post in another thread entirely, Sergeant Mac linked this video...
YouTube - Carlie Brucia Abduction
I must have watched the movie at least 3 dozen times by now.
Let's ignore the fact that she had poor situational awareness. She's an eleven year-old girl walking home through a car wash parking lot, but let's forget that for a moment. We all have our moments of weakness and to say that you could never be caught off guard is to be naive. We prepare for the worst, this is the worst, let's role with it. While I would HOPE that all of us would be able to avoid this situation by utilizing good situational awareness, that's not what I want to talk about.
Nor do I want to talk about THIS PARTICULAR situation. It's a tragic situation, for sure, but not what I want to focus on.
What I want to point out is how contact was made.
The attacker in this situation did nothing more and nothing less than grab her right arm. He spends four to five seconds talking to her (more than likely threatening her or promising her she will not be hurt if she complies with his demands) and then he drags her away out of camera view.
All I could think about when I watched this video, time after time after time, was that if she were me, and I were in her place, my first contact with this attacker would have been him grabbing my gun arm. I would be forced to go either hand-to-hand or to move to a weak-sided tool of defense. Which, if you watch the video, would have been more than ideal in this particular scenario. There are several opportunities where a weak-sided defense tool could have been used to escape this situation.
I gave myself a little pat on the back for my decision to carry my Ka-Bar TDI weak-side with my spare mag, but then it plagued me that the TDI is usually the ONLY tool I carry weak-sided (my Ti-Light is strong side as well as any other folders I carry), and what's worse is that I don't ALWAYS carry it. In that case I would be forced to go hand-to-hand in order to free myself; a skill I have not practiced as oft as I should.
In this particular situation, the TDI would have been well utilized (were it available) because the nature of it being a fixed blade would make it easy to deploy needing no special flicks of the wrist or devices to make it ready. A couple stabs and slashs to the abdomen and/or arm and more than likely I would have been free to run and the BG would be picking his intestines off of the pavement.
But I still remembered that I didn't carry my TDI today and no matter how well-utilized a tool could be, it's only as good as it's presence in the situation.
So, to better round my skills, when JD got home from work today I described the scenario to him, told him to grab my gun arm and we walked through some hand-to-hand combat ways to break free and escape (his combat training helps him to better teach me practical and effective ways to escape certain situations and his patience and care make him a very effective teacher).
So, after beating JD up a little bit and going through some other grabs and scenarios I felt a little more prepared should I need to go hand-to-hand but felt that the BEST defense would be a defensive tool (or two) specifically designated for weak-sided combat should the strong side be disabled in some way before a gun can even enter the picture.
My resolve to carry the TDI more often and possibly stick another folder in my left front pocket (or back pocket) was reinforced three-fold.
So what of it? Do you have a designated weak-side defensive tool?
If not, why not?
If so, what do you have and how would you utilize it should your strong side be disabled?
YouTube - Carlie Brucia Abduction
I must have watched the movie at least 3 dozen times by now.
Let's ignore the fact that she had poor situational awareness. She's an eleven year-old girl walking home through a car wash parking lot, but let's forget that for a moment. We all have our moments of weakness and to say that you could never be caught off guard is to be naive. We prepare for the worst, this is the worst, let's role with it. While I would HOPE that all of us would be able to avoid this situation by utilizing good situational awareness, that's not what I want to talk about.
Nor do I want to talk about THIS PARTICULAR situation. It's a tragic situation, for sure, but not what I want to focus on.
What I want to point out is how contact was made.
The attacker in this situation did nothing more and nothing less than grab her right arm. He spends four to five seconds talking to her (more than likely threatening her or promising her she will not be hurt if she complies with his demands) and then he drags her away out of camera view.
All I could think about when I watched this video, time after time after time, was that if she were me, and I were in her place, my first contact with this attacker would have been him grabbing my gun arm. I would be forced to go either hand-to-hand or to move to a weak-sided tool of defense. Which, if you watch the video, would have been more than ideal in this particular scenario. There are several opportunities where a weak-sided defense tool could have been used to escape this situation.
I gave myself a little pat on the back for my decision to carry my Ka-Bar TDI weak-side with my spare mag, but then it plagued me that the TDI is usually the ONLY tool I carry weak-sided (my Ti-Light is strong side as well as any other folders I carry), and what's worse is that I don't ALWAYS carry it. In that case I would be forced to go hand-to-hand in order to free myself; a skill I have not practiced as oft as I should.
In this particular situation, the TDI would have been well utilized (were it available) because the nature of it being a fixed blade would make it easy to deploy needing no special flicks of the wrist or devices to make it ready. A couple stabs and slashs to the abdomen and/or arm and more than likely I would have been free to run and the BG would be picking his intestines off of the pavement.
But I still remembered that I didn't carry my TDI today and no matter how well-utilized a tool could be, it's only as good as it's presence in the situation.
So, to better round my skills, when JD got home from work today I described the scenario to him, told him to grab my gun arm and we walked through some hand-to-hand combat ways to break free and escape (his combat training helps him to better teach me practical and effective ways to escape certain situations and his patience and care make him a very effective teacher).
So, after beating JD up a little bit and going through some other grabs and scenarios I felt a little more prepared should I need to go hand-to-hand but felt that the BEST defense would be a defensive tool (or two) specifically designated for weak-sided combat should the strong side be disabled in some way before a gun can even enter the picture.
My resolve to carry the TDI more often and possibly stick another folder in my left front pocket (or back pocket) was reinforced three-fold.
So what of it? Do you have a designated weak-side defensive tool?
If not, why not?
If so, what do you have and how would you utilize it should your strong side be disabled?