.40 Caliber Failure

It has often been said that a handgun's purpose is to keep you alive until you can get to your long gun. There is truth to that. All handguns are a compromise in power to make the firearm more portable. As a result, handgun ammunition is a compromise as well, to allow the portable firearm to be fired without injury.

Paul at Guns Crime and Video tape has a salient post up, with video tape, of a perp who was shot by police officers, twice. In the chest. With a .40S&W handgun. That is him spurting crimson from his chest wounds while he walks struts out in handcuffs in the custody of two officers. Whether Mullet Man had meth in his veins is unknown. What is known is he was walking, using both arms, and thinking after two hits with .40S&W.

There are those who declare any round that does not begin with the digit four to be underpowered. Compared to a rifle or a shotgun, all handguns are underpowered. It is up to the defender to chose the most effective tool for the job within the limitations that present themselves. Then shoot to stop the attack. The attack will stop when the attacker is on the ground.

The .380 ACP

"From a few feet away, she shot him in the head with the .380. At that point, he moved quickly, causing her second shot to miss. He then grabbed the gun away from her and went outside and called the police on his cell phone. When police and paramedics arrived, they found that the bullet had entered the skin on his head, and burrowed around a few inches without entering the skull. This left what the officer described as a “mole tunnel” in the skin. The shootee refused to be taken to the hospital, and was treated and released at the scene by the paramedics. At no time did he lose consciousness or the ability to fight back."

Syd explains why I am not a fan of the .380. Every caliber, with the possible exception of the magnums, has anecdotal evidence of failure to penetrate the human skull. Some calibers though, have more failure stories than others. The .380 is one of those.

One of the compromises that many people unwittingly make in a concealed handgun is a shorter barrel for concealability, and a lesser caliber for greater capacity. These decisions often decrease the terminal performance of the person's handgun of choice. The cold dry science of ballistics is lost on many handgunners and others just don't want to be bothered. What must be remembered is the concealed handgun is a last ditch device to preserve one's life from a lethal threat. If it fails to immediately incapacitate the threat, the carrier's life is still at risk.

One does not need to fully understand all the details of terminal ballistics, nor does a person have to conduct their own research. The work has been done. The Firearms Tactical Institute is one unbiased resource to go to. The decision to carry a firearm for self defense is a serious one. The choice of caliber and firearm is integral to that decision. I do not wish to disparage a person's choice of either, but it is incumbent on the person to make a well informed choice. It may be the choice between life or death.

Syd's Thoughts

Sufficient Calibers

Retired Army Green Beret Smokey Taylor was court martialed this weekend, and came away feeling good about it. Taylor, at age 80 the oldest member of Chapter XXXIII of the Special Forces Association, was on mock trial by his peers under the charge of "Failing to use a weapon of sufficient caliber" in the shooting of an intruder at his home in Knoxville, Tennesee, in December.

The entire affair, of course, was very much tongue in cheek. Taylor had been awakened in the early morning hours of Dec. 17, 2007, when an intruder broke into his home. He investigated the noises with one of his many weapons in hand. When the intruder threatened him with a knife, Taylor warned him, then brought his .22 caliber pistol to bear and shot him right between the eyes.

"That boy had the hardest head I’ve ever seen," Taylor said after his trial. "The bullet bounced right off." The impact knocked the would be thief down momentarily. He crawled out of the room then got up and ran out the door and down the street. Knoxville police apprehended him a few blocks away and he now awaits trial in the Knox County jail.

The charges against Taylor were considered to be serious. He is a retired Special Forces Weapons Sergeant with extensive combat experience during the wars in Korea and Vietnam. "Charges were brought against him under the premise that he should have saved the county and taxpayers the expense of a trial," said Chapter XXXIII President Bill Long of Asheville. "He could have used a .45 or .38. The .22 just wasn’t big enough to get the job done."

Taylor’s defense attorney, another retired Weapons Sergeant, disagreed. He said Taylor had done the right thing in choosing to arm himself with a .22 caliber handgun. "If he’d used a .45 or something like that the round would have gone right through the perp, the wall, the neighbor’s wall and possibly injured some innocent child asleep in its bed," he said. "I believe the evidence shows that Smokey Taylor exercised excellent judgment in his choice of weapons. He did nothing wrong, and clearly remains to this day an excellent weapons man."

Counsel for the defense then floated a theory as to why the bullet bounced off the perp’s forehead. "He was victimized by old ammunition," he said, "just as he was in Korea and again in Vietnam, when his units were issued ammo left over from World War II."

Taylor said nothing in his own defense, choosing instead to allow his peers to debate the matter. After the trial he said the ammunition was indeed old and added the new information that the perp had soiled his pants as he crawled out of the house. "I would have had an even worse mess to clean up if it had gone through his forehead," Taylor said. "It was good for both of us that it didn’t."

Following testimony from both sides, Taylor was acquitted of the charges and was given a round of applause. Meanwhile, back in Knox County, the word is out: Don’t go messing with Smokey Taylor. He just bought a whole bunch of fresh ammo.

.22 Long Rifle for Self Defense

In a previous post I may have given the impression that I advocate .22 Long rifle as a defensive caliber. If that was the case, I wish to correct that impression. In a rifle or a handgun, a well aimed .22 bullet is adequate for taking squirrels and other small game. It is true that a face full of .22 ammo will cause most attackers to cease their activities. It is also true that the .22 has taken more lives than any other caliber.

I am against .22 ammo for self defense for several reasons. It's incapacitation record is low. The .22 is on record as having caused more deaths than any other caliber. The deaths all to often occur long after the gun was fired, and the statistics are skewed by the sheer volume of .22 caliber weapons in existence however. Most of these deaths are due to accidents, not attacks. The argument for "a faceful of .22" holds just as true as the argument for a faceful of .40S&W.

What is lost on many novices is the actual dynamics of self defense. With a .22 pistol, it would take seven well aimed shots to inject the same lead volume of one bullet of .45ACP. Those seven shots take time, and the cumulative effect may not be reached until minutes or even hours later. People have been shot in the face with a .22 and lived. While you are squeezing off your second and third shot, your attacker will not be just standing there waiting for more. They will be continuing the attack, or making it a lot more difficult to shoot them again.

Before a jury, seven shots to the face with a 22 caliber weapon has a much greater impact than one shot to the face with a 45. When one must defend their actions in a court of law, the number of shots often hold great significance with jury members who do not understand the dynamics of self defense. To a jury, seven shots of anything to the face is horrible overkill. One 12 gauge blast to center mass with a duck gun is restraint. Never mind the ballistics or other facts involved, it's the impression the attorneys are able to exploit and the jury develops that affects the verdict. To survive a lethal encounter intact, a person must also survive the legal entanglements afterwards.

The first shot in a gunfight is often the defining shot of a gunfight. When that shot is made in self defense, it needs to have maximum impact on the aggressor. That is why I advocate the 12 gauge shotgun for the home and the .45ACP or .40S&W for carry. None of my preferred self defense weapons force the defender to shoot the attacker in the face multiple times to increase the chances of survival. All have the capability of stopping an attacker with a center of mass shot. Of course, as shown in the George Temple incident, multiple COM hits of .45ACP may not be enough. There are many articles written by men more knowledgeable than I on the various aspects of ammo and caliber selection. I will defer to their expertise when it comes to muzzle energy and other variables such as Relative Incapacitation Index.

.22 Long Rifle ammunition is notorious for it's inconsistency in ignition, as is any rimfire cartridge. This inconsistency in ignition is as unacceptable in a defensive gun as having tires that may not stay inflated on your car. When a life is on the line, any history of ammunition failure is unacceptable.

All guns depend on one variable for stopping a determined attacker. That variable is user input, the willingness to use the weapon and the capability the shooter possesses for hitting their target. If the defender refuses to shoot, or is a poor marksman, a grenade launcher will not have any impact. The .22 handgun is better than a pointy stick if one needs a tool to defend one's life. A larger caliber is better than the .22 though. The .22 pistol is a fantastic tool to get acquainted with firearms and learn marksmanship with. The Ruger MKII and Browning Buckmark are accurate, and inexpensive to buy and shoot. That allows a person to shoot them a lot. The volume of shooting with an accurate, low recoil gun is what allows a person to develop into a superior marksman the fastest. At least that is what I have seen.