DON'T SHOOT YOUR DICK OFF

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This video caught my attention. The title is almost impossible to ignore. Appendix carry of a Glock 23, by an ostensibly well trained individual in a professional training event. Lets discuss this one.

The strong side carry advocates will immediately point to the deficiencies of the appendix carry concept. I don’t think that is it. There are the Gun Karens that will say that all unintentional discharges are negligent discharges. That is nonsense as all we need to do is point to the follies with the SIG P320. Sometimes, as the video states, “shit happens”. It should be our understanding of that truth and then organizing our training to avoid the tolerance stacking that causes it.

Appendix carry of a striker pistol, likely a customized trigger during speed drills, likely during the latter part of the day - tolerance stacking.

• Did appendix contribute to the end result? Without a doubt, but the very real advantages in concealment and draw access of appendix cannot be denied.

• Did the striker fired Glock pistol contribute to the end result? Also without a doubt, bit we all know that trying to convince a Glockster to trade his pistol for a TDA would be like convincing a jihadist to eat a BLT. I am not sure, nor did the video mention any “improvements” that were made to the pistol, but I suspect it may not have been a “stock trigger”. Not that stock Glock triggers are brag-worthy.

• Was the fact that they were working on speed drills a contributing factor? Also without doubt. And I will discuss that one as well here.

In my thirty years of teaching - mostly intermediate to advanced personnel - I have seen a few unintentional discharges (UD). Invariably they involved an attempt to exceed natural contextual speed (speed drills involving drawing), all were with striker fired pistols (both stock and custom), all had a competitive element to them (team of SEALs seeing who would be faster and more accurate), and all took place during the second part of the day.

I saw a US Army operator - using the same kit he had used in combat on multiple tours - draw, snag on his chest rig and shoot himself in the right leg. I saw an LE Counter Terror Officer draw and put a round into the deck with his Glock when doing a move off the X drill in class. I could go on and list all six that I have seen. But I am aware of more at other training venues. These are not advertised by anyone of course, which gives this video greater credibility. And the courage of the speaker is to be commended...I would certainly not have said a thing.

So on to tolerance stacking.

Appendix carry is something I started doing in 2005. I don’t recall anyone else in the training space doing so at the time. I didn’t invent it, I simply popularized. First time I saw it was with a DEA operator I worked with. He wore a Sig P226 that way and he was very quick, as well as very subtle and smooth. But Appendix Carry is not for everyone. It requires a certain level of skill and attention from the gunman, and the margin for error is considerably slimmer than any other form of carry. You must earn appendix carry through careful repetitions. I can’t help but think that few of the appendix pistoleros out there have actually put in the time to earn it.

Striker fired pistols are the norm for much of the CCW and LE worlds now. But I know that they also reduce your margin of error considerably. They are great when you are at your best, but a liability when you are not. Like the man said, “shit happens”. I think it happens more easily with a striker fired pistol.

I had a very successful doctor student. This guy was not quite Elon Musk, but I would not be surprised if they had met at some point. He always had a very nice tuned high end pistol in class. But it was always a double action weapon. It was initially a Sig P226 of some sort, and later an HK P30 series. All with marvelous DA triggers and optics and everything you could ask for. All the others, myself included, were using Glocks. I asked him once why he chose that system. He told me that he had been an ER Doctor for years and he had handled a plethora of self inflicted gunshot injuries. And that these ranged from a neophyte that had little skill, to high level sport shooters, to legitimate police operators. All of them without exception, involved striker fired pistols.

There is an old term - Speed Kills. The phrase means that moving or doing things too quickly potentially causes great harm. It is used both literally for driving excessively fast and metaphorically for rushing through your work. I agree with that term, and specially in the context of gun fighting. The training space has become obsessed with the idea of speed. They sacrifice accuracy for faster times on the clock and call it success. I wrote and videoed posts here on Contextual Speed. That is what I train and teach, nit the clock. Some of us will be faster than others, but that is irrelevant in a gun fight. It is timing, smoothness of movement, and accuracy that will win.

Knowing that, as the speaker notes, “Shit happens”, and understanding my discussions on Tolerance Stacking, (that holster, weapon, and the quest for speed were the cause of this) - could this “shit” have happened in a gunfight? The answer is in the affirmative.

Examine your weapons, holsters, and most importantly your training. Then be brutally honest with yourself and examine if you are creating any “tolerance staking”, that can lead to a similar situation at the worst possible time. Driving on the edge is great when you are 100% focused, but we all know that we are not at our best 100% of the time.