How would you react if...

[thebigspendur]

So your a gun enthusiast and you consider yourself a real pistolero. You go to the range often and consider your self a real dead-eye. You also have considered what you would do if someone broke into your house and that you would not hesitate to defend your family and your property.

So you go to the range today and you have a pistol and you buy your two boxes of ammo and go inside and crank out the target to 15 yards and as you finish firing the 6th round all of a sudden from out of nowhere, from inside the range to the side some dude pops out with a gun in hand and starts firing at you.

So what are you going to do? He's already started firing at you so if he's a decent shot you've already been hit. How many seconds will you hesitate before firing? How many more rounds will you take? Will you have the presence of mind to immediately seek cover or just stand there? Will you just panic and do nothing or fire wildly and miss totally? What if you have a 6 shot revolver? Think you can unload and reload under that pressure?

You see you were part of an experiment.They weren't real bullets.

So now transpose that to an incident where your at home one dark winter night and your on your computer and you hear breaking glass and you just happen to have a gun in a locked box in that room. You hear footsteps, its dark in the hall. How long is it going to take you to retrieve the weapon under pressure? have you practiced doing that? You enter the hallway and you see a dark figure and can see he's holding something but you can't tell what it is but you think its a gun. How long will it take you to decide what to do. He's in the dark and is moving you came out out of a lit room and are framed by the light and stand out like a target at a shooting range. Your also standing still in total panic. He sees you and your gun and starts firing. Now its real bullets whizzing by. So how would you react and how long would it take you to react? Think you'd be a dead-eye now?

Just food for thought.

With the exception of the last paragraph I've been through training like that just that we used rubber bullets in a .357 propelled by the primer alone. If your hit within 10 yards or so it hurts like hell.

After some responses I'll tell you what highly trained Federal Agents did.

[JMS]

No one can answer this question with any certainty unless they have been under fire before.

[JMS]

I am curious Sir. Is this thread intended to illuminate our possible problem areas in home defense so that we may endeavor to improve or is it intended to suggest that home protection is best left to the experts so why even bother trying to protect your family and yourself under such possible situations?

[59caddy]

both scenes are a tough call...but on the first one, if i get a chance to see someone pointing a gun at me and firing and i am able he/she is going to get it right back, if i am able to fire and have not been injured. if the person was not shooting live rounds, then to bad. do not play games with people with weapons in their hands.
the second one where someone has broken into my house is different as i will
hopefully fire on them first and i intend to take them out, not just injure. i keep a 44 magnum short barrel by my beside. i also have other weapons throughout the house.
but i can bet others will have different views on this subject. but after having one house broken into and have been fired upon, i do not take it lightly.
also i would like to praise anyone willing to put on a police uniform and wear that weapon and badge and be a target for all the crazies out there. my hats off to you and your brothers and sisters doing a great job out there..

[JimmyHAD]

I am at work now with a 357 mag on my person. At the computer at home the same gun is within reach. By my lazy boy chair is a 40 Sig and by my bedside a 10mm glock. Woe to the miscreant who trespasses in my space.

[Pete_S]

How did they do the first experiment? I can't see them giving the person being tested live rounds.

[wpfontenot]

No one can answer this question with any certainty unless they have been under fire before.

Gospel truth right here. I find it funny how many people talk a good game and have never been in this situation. 1 trip to Afghanistan and 1 trip to Iraq taught me that.