Weapons qualifying / Do it right!

[bpdblue]

I just had to qualify at the shooting range to get my guard firearms (exposed) permit.

Several others also were qualifying at the same time. Some of these people shot HORRIBLY, even though it was not their first time. One guy even punched holes in his target, using the empty brass from the rounds he did fire, so he could qualify. (We knew this because it was a 50 round course to qualify, and his target had 64 holes in it, and most of the holes were perfectly round, with no bullet marking at the hole, where as the rounds that did hit were gray at the hole with the paper around the hole having a shreaded look to it. He, of course denied it, saying he could not understand how this happened.)

So please, PLEASE, go out and practice your shooting often. Yes, it costs a decent amount of money to do this, but the reason you are going to be carrying a firearm is to TAKE SOMEONES LIFE.

You don't get trained to shoot to wound. So you need to shoot straight and true to save your life or some other innocent persons life. If you have to shoot it will be among the most stressful times in your life, so if your no good at the range, you WILL BE WORSE when the real situation in using your weapon arrives.

If you are not able to qualify reasonably easy, you probably should not be carrying the GUN.

Maybe you should just carry tear gas, or a baton.

I also believe that you need to train with the weapon you are carrying, and to train with the actual bullet you are going to be carrying in the gun while on duty. (In other words, no training with .38 wadcutters when you are going to be carrying a .357 round on duty.)

I'm sorry if this bursts any of your bubbles on the desire to carry a gun, but your ability to shoot, if you are going to carry a gun, is of the upmost importance so as to hit what your shooting at, and so you don't hit an unintended, innocent target- meaning PERSON.

Any one of you that does not understand what I am talking about here should NOT carry a gun, and if you do, and you need to use it in a gun fight, will probably be killed. THINK ABOUT IT.

[Hank1]

Amen Sir! I concur. If one can not qualify and attempts to "cheat" to carry, he/she should be disqualified.

Be Safe,

Hank

[craig333]

How could it happen? Where was the rangemaster? When I qualified he kept a tight leash on everyone and had a backup just in case he missed anything.

[SecTrainer]

Now, let's not jump to conclusions. Perhaps his target had 64 holes because the other bad shots beside him hit his target 14 times!

I say, just come to the range with your target already showing the center completely punched out by your deadly marksmanship. Drop it off and go back home. This would save all that bothersome shooting and noise and everything, to say nothing of the expense.

[Bill Warnock]

Now, let's not jump to conclusions. Perhaps his target had 64 holes because the other bad shots beside him hit his target 14 times!

I say, just come to the range with your target already showing the center completely punched out by your deadly marksmanship. Drop it off and go back home. This would save all that bothersome shooting and noise and everything, to say nothing of the expense.

SecTrainer, I sometimes feel that is being done even as we write our musings. As to the original post made by BPDBLUE, leadership appears to be lacking. What ever happened to the good ole days when you had a scorer and observer?
Enjoy the day,
Bill

[BadBoynMD]

How could it happen? Where was the rangemaster? When I qualified he kept a tight leash on everyone and had a backup just in case he missed anything.

I wondered the same exact thing. When I qualified, my instructor was RIGHT behind me. He would take my mag from my holstered weapon, load the rounds in himself and then, re-insert my mag into my weapon (he kept track of the rounds I shot, so there was always a round chambered). So there was no way I could cheat. Not that I needed to...

I know some companies that would, have other officers firing rounds into the target, of the officer that couldn't shoot well so they would pass.

[HomeInCalifornia]

Co-sign on the need for training.

I've been a gun enthusiast and shooter before being a guard, and I go to the range once or twice a week to maintain my skills. But I think if people just go to the range only twice a month, that's good enough to maintain some amount of marksmanship.

I think as important as marksmanship is to attain gun handling skills. On the draw, reload, move and shoot. You can do that on the cheap with regular dryfire at home with snap caps.

[bpdblue]

The set up for this course was in an indoor firing range, with 10 shooting stalls. Each shooting stall had a small wall divider on each side of the shooter, and a small table directly in front of the shooter, for placing your gun, ammo, and equipment. Basically it was, from my experience, a typical indoor range.

There were eight shooters, and one range master who stood as far behind the shooters as she could, but the distance she could go back was only approx six feet. This meant she could only watch two to three shooters at one time, so she had to keep walking back and forth.

I totally agree that the shooter with the 64 holes should have been disqualified, but the instructor told me that since she didn't see him punching his holes, all she could do was make him qualify all over again. She did keep a good eye on him the second time, and unfortunatly, the second time he passed with a score of 200 out of a minimum passing score of 200, with 250 being perfect (at 50 rounds, with a 5 point maximum for each round.)

Unfortunatly again, since several of us were qualifying with a second caliber, the range master was not able to keep tabs on most of the other shooters, so who knows what happened there. And believe me, some of the other shooters also didn't qualify the first time through, including one guy who even brought his own gun. (if you wanted to bring one gun to qualify, that was fine. But if you wanted to qualify with a second caliber, they wanted you to use a range gun, which was included in the cost of the class.)

Who knew that a little while after I posted this thread, that piece of crap in OMAHA would go on a shooting rampage, and kill all those innocent people. If one of the lousy shooters that I had to shoot with were there when the shooting occurred, all they would have done was get themselves killed, and maybe pi$$ed off the shooter even more, possibly causing him to kill even more people before he shot himself.

[NRM_Oz]

BPD - the indoor range for my annuals have us inside the firing range where the targets (silouettes) are all lined up and each of us is lined up behind them at 3, 5, 7 , 10 metre lines (3m = 10 feet). If you cannot hit anything at 10 feet you should try selling flowers for a job. Last annual I had a 9mm and to prove weapons handling and speed, we were asked to fire 7 rounds for the .38's and 14 rounds for me (9 round per mag). I had fired off my 14 before most of them had reloaded and all before #7 shot was fired by the others.

This was to prove how fast an aggressor would be in real life with a semi-auto compared to an inexperienced shooter with a revolver or even with an adrenalin rush through their body. On another range we would shoot at 50 feet with the .38's for 12 rounds just to ensure you could actually find a target and most people could not hit anything at that distance.

[DarkMetalWolf]

Going to the rage as often as you can is very important, however, if one can not afford to go as much as they would like with cost of ammo going up and range fees as well, AT LEAST do the basics at home dry firing in the mirror! Drawing from the holster, reloading and dry firing can all be done to keep the basic skills sharp. Then go to the range as you can. I know as well as anyone the pay we receive versus the cost of living is always a factor. But, there is NO excuse for not practicing the basics almost every day at home.

[ESI AGENT]

I was at a range doing my weekly shoot and a new range master approached me and said "Your not in law enforcement are you" I said no "why" I was expecting security guard jokes. He said"because you shoot to good" I'v seen many persons in law enforcement who cannot qualify. POST stardards are not high speed standards. It's a standard and not a high one as is the security qulification. As I said before their should be regional training centers for security that enforce standards, even low ones.

[HomeInCalifornia]

Going to the rage as often as you can is very important, however, if one can not afford to go as much as they would like with cost of ammo going up and range fees as well, AT LEAST do the basics at home dry firing in the mirror! Drawing from the holster, reloading and dry firing can all be done to keep the basic skills sharp. Then go to the range as you can. I know as well as anyone the pay we receive versus the cost of living is always a factor. But, there is NO excuse for not practicing the basics almost every day at home.

That you're right about. It's expensive to shoot. Taking it up as a sport, be it IPSC, IDPA or even bullseye pistol can cost as much as golfing as a sport. Dryfire, like you suggest, is especially good.

One thing I do to defray costs is to use my Advantage Arms .22lr conversion for my Glock. For the same price of a box of 50 for 9mm, at $10, you can buy a brick of 500 for .22lr. Then, with the conversion kit, $20 can get you 1,000 rounds of shooting. Then, you can finish off with a half-box of 9mm at the end to get some recoil practice.

Also, it helps to get an annual membership at a range. It saves money in the long run.

[DeputyJ]

ESI Agent,

What is the standard security qualification in California these days? I shot one in 1995 for my security open carry permit (California) and it was easier than the POST academy course (althought both were a joke in my opinion). The security qualification only went out to a distance of 15 yards, no drawing from our hoslters, standing only and no barricades. The POST course had shooting at 25 yards (barricaded), shooting from a kneeling position and of course we drew our firearms from our holsters.

Stay Safe.

[craig333]

Okay, California rules (i dug out my training manual, not by memory) stage 1. 15 yards, 6 rounds in 30 seconds (standing).
Stage 2 , 7 yards, 14 rounds in 45 seconds (includes 2 reloads) (load 6, 6 and 2) 6 standing, eight kneeling.
Stage 3, 7 yards, 12 rounds in 25 seconds (includes reloads) (load 6 and 6) 6 strong hand unsupported (reload and switch hands) 6 weak hand unsupported.
Stage 4 7 yards 6 rounds in 10 seconds (any position)
Stage 5, 6 rounds (2 rounds in 3 seconds (3 stages).
First 50 rounds is practice, second 50 is for scoring.
Must score 200 out of 250.

Obviously reload status changes depending on the capacity of the firearm you're qualifying with.

[N. A. Corbier]

Most security firearms "qualifications" are only to show to the state that the individual can accurately hit a man sized target in close quarters.

It is not designed to be, nor will it probably ever be, an instructional course. It is simply to prove to the state that the armed licensee will have good odds of hitting the target he intends to shoot at.

Why do you think the courses cover what they cover?

Any actual instruction must be taken by the individual licensee.

This is the same concept that unarmed security "training" is. The test to get the license is to show a minimum level of competence as defined under state statute. The course is educational only in that the student is to meet the minimum level of competence under state statute.

Anything else that the instructor decides to teach, beyond the minimum qualifications under state statute, is entirely up to the instructor.