By Dave Campbell, Editor in Chief
Photos by Hannele Lahti
Most of us hate being awakened unexpectedly; but even more so when it’s your lifemate desperately whispering, “I just heard a noise downstairs.” In an instant you must go from relaxed slumber to full alert. Your senses must be acutely aware of what is in place and what is not. And when you awake to the unfamiliar sound of someone intruding in your home, you must be prepared to make instant decisions and have the motor skills and tools necessary to neutralize any threat.
But what if the crashing that stirred you from your slumber was one of your kids tripping over his or her favorite toy left out before bedtime? You certainly don’t want to hit the staircase racking the slide of your shotgun or pistol. If you live in the country, far from streetlights, and you awoke to the sound of the family dog barking at something that entered your yard, you’ll need to determine whether it’s another dog, a lost motorist or someone intending you or your family harm.
Pick any possible shooting scenario where ambient light is low or non-existent, and it quickly becomes obvious that one of your highest priorities is identifying whether the intruder is a threat or a non-threat. To do that you must be able to see it.
Flashlights
Like a lot of you, I could overfill the bed of a large pickup truck with all the flashlights I’ve owned. Big ones, little ones, bright ones, dim ones, nice ones and trash—we’ve all had them—and they always fail at the worst time. Is there a good time for a flashlight to fail? The ubiquitous flashlight has undergone quite an evolution from the pressed-metal sportsman lights of 40 years ago that ran on two or three C- or D-cell batteries through the machined aluminum lights utilizing five or six of those same batteries, often doubling as a club in some altercations.
However, the tactical use of a flashlight has evolved, and so have the lights. Today we have flashlights that are about the size of two stacked 12-gauge shells, and they generate a tremendous amount of light—enough to temporarily blind an interloper in low light. How do I know that? I played the bad guy during some force-on-force exercises at the SureFire Training Institute, and believe me, when that light hits your eyes in near total darkness there is an involuntary reaction to close them. It’s difficult for an adversary to be effective with his eyes closed.
It used to be taught that when using a flashlight in a tactical situation, the smart operator would hold the light in his offhand extended as far from his body as possible so that if the bad guy was going to shoot at the source of the light, he’d have a better chance of missing the operator. This, of course, assumes the bad guy is a decent shot, which records show is generally not the case. Later, as smaller and more powerful lights became readily available, other advanced tactics were developed.
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Momentary light is provided by the integral, pressure-sensitive rocker pad. |
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| Besides momentary operation, the fore-end has switches for both on and disable. |
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| SureFire’s Integrated Fore-end Shotgun Light replaces the factory fore-end and transforms the run-of-the-mill pump action into a combat ready, tactical weapon. |
Light + Gun = 1
I’m not sure exactly who or when the first flashlight was attached to a gun, though I recall a humorous example involving Bill Murray as the intellectually challenged savant Carl in “Caddy Shack” duct taping a large flashlight to a rifle to shoot gophers on the golf course at night. But sometime in the mid 1990s some bright guy got the idea to mount a tactical light on a pistol. Early examples were a bit crude with custom-made mounting brackets that either clamped or screwed onto the gun.
Today there are guns with accessory rails cast or forged into their frames. Manufacturers like SureFire have come up with mounts that mesh seamlessly with the firearm. Even pocket pistols and hideout guns are so equipped. It’s almost as if any gun that might be used tactically has to have a light rail on it.
Now I have to make a confession: I’m not all that wild about complex accessories hung on a gun—hunting or self-defense. It was only about six years ago that I finally came around to really trying the popular, variable-power scope, and I still have a gnawing distrust for it deep inside. But I’ve learned that, like any tool, it can be managed and offers some advantages in certain situations. So it is with lights on a gun. Before I went to the SureFire Training Institute it struck me as ridiculous to attach a flashlight to a pistol and start looking for bad guys. I have had an epiphany.
I have gone from having one handheld light dedicated for “bump-in-the-night” scenarios that I have learned to deploy with the offhand to lights permanently mounted on all of my primary home-defense guns—pistol, shotgun and carbine. What prompted my sudden intuitive perception was exposure to the tactics that have been developed to use this combination of tools into a single platform. For a tool is only useful to those with the knowledge to operate it.
How it’s Done
The secret to properly using a light on a gun is to use it sparingly and only momentarily. Only an idiot would simply turn it on and begin searching for the thing that went bump in the night as he would looking for a blown fuse in a fuse box. You might as well hang a target on your chest and start yelling, “Please shoot me!
But take that same light, and start sweeping it across your environment quickly, turning it on and off at the end of each pass. Now you have a tool to help you navigate the invisible, as well as identify a target. Sweep high; then sweep low; sweep across; then diagonally, with no predictability—completely random. If there is a bad guy lying in wait, he’ll be more confused as to your whereabouts. Combine this tactic with other time-proven ones of effectively utilizing cover and concealment, and a trained partner, suddenly the advantage begins to shift.
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| The momentary and full-on rocker switches on the SureFire X200 can easily be depressed using either thumb. However, the author has found operation uncomfortable due to recoil, and believes that shooters would be better served with a tape switch that mounts to the frontstrap. |
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| Integral accessory rails have become the standard for new semi-automatic pistols because of the increased popularity of tactical lights and other accessories. |
To demonstrate this we went through an indoor simulator at the Orange County (California) Sheriff’s range. This state-of-the-art facility can replicate virtually any environment known to have occurred in Southern California. Within the indoor portion of the range was set up a generic building with multiple indoor rooms. When the lights were turned off we went through some simple drills on room clearing put on by SureFire’s Bill Murphy and Doug Martin. Both are working police officers on Southern California SWAT teams. Much of the exercises and training—admittedly we did not go through a full-blown course; this was a demonstration—centered on the basics of entry and corners. But the use of a weapon-mounted light was new. By sweeping small areas quickly and operating the light switch much as one would a paint sprayer, it’s possible to confuse an individual as to your whereabouts and consequently reduce his enthusiasm to challenge or harm you.
In executing these demonstrations we had the opportunity to be both good guy and bad guy, so we were able to see for ourselves the effectiveness of the light when it is employed correctly. Initially we used “red guns”—non-firing plastic replicas with lights mounted on them to give us the feel but operate in a safe environment. Then it came time to “pump up the volume.”
Adrenaline Rush
Once the basics were driven home, we traded our red guns for SIMUNITION® pistols. SIMUNITION® are similar to paintball, but the ammo and projectiles are smaller and more in line with live ammo in appearance. The projectiles aren’t deadly, but they can be painful and dangerous, so protective gear, like goggles and a neck cuff, are required. Still, the prospect of taking one of those stinging mini-paintballs is enough to stimulate a performance better than one might think one is capable of. One of my coworkers from another magazine had been nearly salivating at the thought of putting a paintball in my rear end. As it turned out she didn’t get a chance, but the war mentality was on, as was the adrenaline.
The bad guy for one scenario was Derek McDonald, SureFire’s director of marketing. Our briefing revealed there was a man (McDonald) with a history of drug abuse and violence in the building. We—my partner for this exercise was American Hunter Associate Editor Jeff Johnston—were to search the building and arrest him (the Institute is setup for law enforcement, so we posed as police officers). I opened the front door carefully and called out, “Anybody in here? Police!” No answer. I called out again, and Johnston and I began to inspect the visible parts of the room with a SureFire X200 light mounted on our Beretta-style SIMUNITION® pistols. “There…!” Johnston blurted as a horrific scream came from my left interrupted him, and the bad guy rushed the door. I saw the flash of a knife in his hand and opened up with the pistol, trying to hold a slight lead on the crossing target. All three of my shots hit McDonald—one on the hand with the knife and two to the torso that would have double-lunged him if it had been live ammo.
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| Two blue LED navigation lights produce enough light to maneuver around obstacles, but do not affect your night vision. |
It may not have been real life, but my heart rate made it feel like the real deal.
Of course, afterward there is a review and critique. Better to have a thick hide for this part, because there is always something that you miss or didn’t handle correctly. For our part Johnston and I, independently and simultaneously, dissolved our partnership as the shooting started; both of us trying to fill the doorframe at the same time. Maybe we were too eager to shoot? Actually it’s quite common once the shooting starts to go into “tunnel-vision” mode and ignore the rest of one’s environment. Point well taken: If you are teamed with a partner, he remains your partner even after the shooting starts, and the plan you developed with him should be adhered to until the environment dictates a revision. Defaulting to a panic-stricken, every-man-for-himself tactic is a recipe for more people—especially the wrong people—getting harmed than is necessary.
In another scenario we approached the building with the pre-op intel that there was an unknown number of homeless guys who may have harmed one of their cohorts during a drunken brawl. Our assignment was to arrest or shoot the right ones (bad guys) and not harm any innocents. Watching others go through similar drills and having some “experience” of our own gave Johnston and me a lot more confidence, and it showed as we began our search.
Immediately I observed a portion of a bad guy from a distant room. And though he tested my nerve by not obeying every order I made, and he held a knife in his hand, I was able to “convince” him with my voice that following my commands to back up and be arrested was a better option than taking a SIMUNITION® paintball in the back. Johnston had similar results with the other bad guy. It’s not always about shooting, but rather learning to make the correct decision about when to shoot that rounds out the training. Your focus should always be about controlling your environment.
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| The Millennium Vertical Foregrip Weapon Light coupled with a M910A flashlight provides the user a rock steady grip and blinding illumination, perfect for tactical applications. |
The Gear
When I encounter a problem or challenge I like to have as many options available to me as possible. Too, my years in the construction industry taught me there is no substitute for the best tool for the job. A tool inadequate for the task at hand invites trouble, and too much tool is clumsy and can actually be a cause of failure to perform the task properly. And so it is with self-defense guns. I want one of each—pistol, shotgun and carbine—at my service. While I obviously won’t have a gun caddy to present me with the right tool at the moment I need it, I like to think I’ll make do with what I have within reach when trouble starts.
The pistol would have to have an integral light rail. Why? It makes for a trimmer and more lightweight platform. I may have to pack this gun, and I still have an innate distrust for complicated gadgets on a gun—especially one I’m going to bet my life upon. My choice was a Springfield Armory Marine Corps Operator. Yeah, it’s another damned 1911, and I’m only too aware of the contingency of Shooting Illustrated readers wanting to bury the timeless warhorse for good. But I’ve been shooting 1911s for 30 years, so give me a break. Your choice can be just that, your choice, and if you prefer a double-action semi-auto or a double-action-only, please, knock yourself out. All are available with light rails, and most have proven quite serviceable in well-trained hands.
Mounted on the Marine Corps Operator is a SureFire X200 LED weapon light, the latest offering from that only-the-best-will-do company. The X200 LED has an internal reflection focusing lens that produces a tight, diamond-shape central beam with a broad peripheral corona to help identify other targets outside the central beam. Its digital current regulation circuitry matches the LED bulb’s current needs to available battery power to maintain a more consistent light output over the battery’s life—in other words it is more efficient at using the power stored in the battery. The X200 LED has momentary and full-on rocker switches, but I have found them to be uncomfortable to shoot. I’ve asked SureFire for—and its engineers are working on—a tape switch that mounts to the frontstrap for a more user-friendly and truly ambidextrous light.
I replaced the fore-end on my Remington 870 shotgun with a SureFire Integrated Fore-end Shotgun Weapon Light. Within this fore-end is a 6-volt SureFire P61 high-output light and a pressure-sensitive rocker pad for momentary operation of the light. The light kicks out some 120 lumens of light for up to 20 minutes that will just about drop you to your knees if it hits your eyes in darkness. There is also a switch to disable the light so it doesn’t come on during storage or at an inopportune time.
For my DPMS AP4 Panther Carbine I first replaced the factory fore-end with a SureFire M73 Picatinny fore-end. Like most AR-type aftermarket fore-ends, the M73 is fully free-floating and allows the mounting of a variety of accessories. To that I mounted a Millennium Vertical Foregrip Weapon Light and a M910A flashlight. The fore-grip has a pair of blue LED navigation lights imbedded in it as well. Pressure-sensitive switches on the grip activate both navigation and target lights. The M910A light produces up to 225 lumens for 20 minutes and will clearly light up a target at 100 yards.
I’m still playing with all three guns; getting used to the operation of the light and gun simultaneously. Like any new tool, its most effective use comes with practice. On tactical shotguns or carbines it’s almost a snap since there is little or no variation from the standard grip, save the operation of the momentary switches, and my low-light hit ratio has already improved drastically. The rocker switches on the pistol are a different matter, and I think once a suitable frontstrap-mounted pressure switch is developed, the training for that gun will ramp up similarly to the long guns. In any case, the tactics I learned at the SureFire Institute and the lights mounted I have on these guns have increased my confidence to handle any low-light confrontation immeasurably.
Packin' It |
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It’s obvious that a light attached to a pistol renders a conventional holster useless. The overall size of the package is larger as well. So the question is how to transport your newfound tool. In the case of my Marine Corps Operator, I knew it would not be carried concealed. Too, a high-ride, belt-mounted holster isn’t as practical for such a large—even larger with the light—pistol. I opted for a tactical rig with a drop to my thigh. —DC *SIMUNITION ® is a registered trademark of General Dynmaics Ordnance and Tactical Systems-Canada, Inc. |
