Tactical Reloads: The Whens and Whys

[ATM]

I will continue to teach both the tactical and retention reloads, while reminding students of their insignificance in lethal force encounters.

Don't forget to explain the insignificance of your first safe gun handling rule while you're at it.

 

[Lelliott8]

Don't forget to explain the insignificance of your first safe gun handling rule while you're at it.

 

[bwframe]

No gunfight experience here, but I try to study it a bit. My SWAG is that if and when reloads were done or required in a gunfight that they were seldom noted or didn't matter to the outcome as investigators could tell. How many gunfights left a downed participant with an empty or more likely jammed up gun?

My guess is that the main reason for needing extra mags is fixing your jammed, broken, mag unintentionally released gun. Experience from a fair amount of classes and competitions is that all guns can and do quit, sometimes right off the bat, sometimes later.

 

[HoughMade]

All I'll say that is after reading detailed analysis of the Newhall Incident, it seems critical to practice reloading and to practice how you will fight, not how you do it when shooting for qualification. If I remember correctly, one CHP officer was killed while trying to retain his empty brass rather than getting back into the fight. Seems dumb...but that's how he did it in practice and the lizard brain takes over when there is lead headed your way.

 

[Lelliott8]

No gunfight experience here, but I try to study it a bit. My SWAG is that if and when reloads were done or required in a gunfight that they were seldom noted or didn't matter to the outcome as investigators could tell. How many gunfights left a downed participant with an empty or more likely jammed up gun?

My guess is that the main reason for needing extra mags is fixing your jammed, broken, mag unintentionally released gun. Experience from a fair amount of classes and competitions is that all guns can and do quit, sometimes right off the bat, sometimes later.

Yup, all true and great points. I also believe that something as trivial as a reload won't get put on a police report. I'm sure the main concern is where the bullets went and why.

 

[bwframe]

All I'll say that is after reading detailed analysis of the Newhall Incident, it seems critical to practice reloading and to practice how you will fight, not how you do it when shooting for qualification. If I remember correctly, one CHP officer was killed while trying to retain his empty brass rather than getting back into the fight. Seems dumb...but that's how he did it in practice and the lizard brain takes over when there is lead headed your way.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newhall_incident

...While there were a number of lessons learned in the aftermath of the Newhall incident, a rumor that Officer Pence took the time to put his spent brass cases in his pocket while reloading during the shooting, because of a habit developed on the police shooting range, was determined to be untrue.

The rumor arose soon after the shooting, during the time that the CHP made improvements to their training. While the CHP did modify their training to eliminate the practice of "pocketing brass" on the range in the aftermath of the Newhall shooting, this was not based on the actions of any officer involved in the incident.

A number of witnesses, including officers who responded to aid the four officers, made it clear that no brass was found in Officer Pence's pants or jacket pockets. CHP Sergeant Harry Ingold (retired) was one of the first cover officers to arrive on the scene the night of the shooting. Ingold found six brass cases on the ground next to the driver's door of Pence's and Allyn's cruiser. Prior to being murdered, Pence had dumped his brass on the ground before partially reloading his revolver. This information has been confirmed by Chief John Anderson, author of The Newhall Incident: America's Worst Cop Massacre...

 

[HoughMade]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newhall_incident

...While there were a number of lessons learned in the aftermath of the Newhall incident, a rumor that Officer Pence took the time to put his spent brass cases in his pocket while reloading during the shooting, because of a habit developed on the police shooting range, was determined to be untrue.

The rumor arose soon after the shooting, during the time that the CHP made improvements to their training. While the CHP did modify their training to eliminate the practice of "pocketing brass" on the range in the aftermath of the Newhall shooting, this was not based on the actions of any officer involved in the incident.

A number of witnesses, including officers who responded to aid the four officers, made it clear that no brass was found in Officer Pence's pants or jacket pockets. CHP Sergeant Harry Ingold (retired) was one of the first cover officers to arrive on the scene the night of the shooting. Ingold found six brass cases on the ground next to the driver's door of Pence's and Allyn's cruiser. Prior to being murdered, Pence had dumped his brass on the ground before partially reloading his revolver. This information has been confirmed by Chief John Anderson, author of The Newhall Incident: America's Worst Cop Massacre...

Well what do you know? As of a couple of years ago, magazines were still publishing that as true...real paper magazines.

 

[bwframe]

Well what do you know? As of a couple of years ago, magazines were still publishing that as true...real paper magazines.

I just searched it, after reading your post with the name of the exact incident. I have heard that same thing over the years, as kind of a bash to competition shooters from the "tactical" folks. The "your competition will get you killed" crowd quotes this incident or one's like it, frequently without specifics.

 

[cedartop]

Well what do you know? As of a couple of years ago, magazines were still publishing that as true...real paper magazines.

Don't feel bad. It is still reported as true by internet experts, even when shown to be wrong. Imagine that.

 

[rhino]

Meh. If you run out of bullets, reload or go to the next gun.

 

[NIFT]

https://activeselfprotection.com/carjackers-overwhelmed-by-prepared-victims/


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6uvbTU4ht3E

Grainy video violence warning!


The first video is a guy that really needed to reload and finally did it ages after he needed it. The second video shows a civilian or off-duty officer possibly performing a "tactical" reload. The commentator mentions it at 3:21. Reloads happen and are sometimes necessary. You can't count on having enough bullets because you don't know how many you will need. That's why a lot of people carry as many as they reasonably can. Why not?

Thanks--much appreciated!
The first video shows neither a tactical nor a retention reload. In the second video, the commentator emphasizes it might or might not be a tactical reload--that he couldn't say for sure. The video is grainy and we cannot see the good guy replace and stow the magazine. All that said, I will yield the benefit of the doubt and say this may be an example, which the commentator says is the first such example he has seen.

I am with Cedartop who said, "Personally I don't have much use for a reload with retention unless done as part of an administrative process as you describe. People can do what they want though. As long as it is done safely and is somewhat relevant I am just happy to see them train."

 

[MohawkSlim]

talked about needing not just a self defense weapon, but an anti terrorism weapon. While it really had me questioning myself for a few days, it just isn't enough.

Truck drivers and bombers aside, the mass shooters tend to pick places where carrying firearms is frowned upon. As such, they're trying to shoot fish in a barrel and the important part of surviving that encounter isn't shooting it out in the barrel but getting out of the barrel as quickly as possible.

If you look at the few incidents where armed resistance has been encountered, the armed resistance has done extremely well. Seems most of those mass shooters aren't interested in getting shot at. Because of that, even a small handgun should be more than sufficient in returning enough fire to exit the situation.

If you want to shoot it out, keep a long gun in the trunk of your vehicle.

If someone is shooting at you, get the gun back in the fight. Yesterday.

If no one is shooting at you, top your gun off and stick the half empty mag in your pocket.

^That's a thing of beauty right there.

We make training super complicated sometimes. More often than not, it's for the glory of the instructor. "I want to teach you this technique..."

Sure, there's a difference between the two reloads but it doesn't need to be a 12 step process with 4 Rules to get it done. Do what Woobie said.

 

[VERT]

Personally I don't have much use for a reload with retention unless done as part of an administrative process as you describe. People can do what they want though. As long as it is done safely and is somewhat relevant I am just happy to see them train.

agreed

I actually use the "tactical reload" quite a bit on the range. It allows me to have 8 or 10 +1 in my gun and I don't have to bend over to pick up my magazine. Plus it looks super cool. Otherwise.....

Meh. If you run out of bullets, reload or go to the next gun.

........ drop the magazine and reload the gun. It has already been pointed out that reloads usually occur after the fight is over or when the gun goes dry.

 

[rhino]

agreed

I actually use the "tactical reload" quite a bit on the range. It allows me to have 8 or 10 +1 in my gun and I don't have to bend over to pick up my magazine. Plus it looks super cool. Otherwise.....

It's how I make ready at both USPSA and IDPA matches. After I chamber rounds from my Barney Mag, I do a "tactical reload" to get a fully charged magazine into the gun. I consider it an administrative reload. The only other time I do it is in IDPA when it is required by the course of fire.

 

[VERT]

I consider it an administrative reload.

As do I.

 

[Vanguard.45]

Curious:
Can anyone cite (with reference) a lethal force encounter with only one intended victim in which he performed either a tactical reload or reload with retention during the fight?

Two points:

1. I should have indicated that this sort of issue is MOST LIKELY most applicable to LEO/ military personnel since they are the ones running toward trouble rather than away from it.

2. With this sort of thinking, one could ask what percentage of concealed carry permit holders have actually ever USED their weapons to shoot a criminal? Realizing that it is such a small percentage as to be insignificant, one could choose to walk around with either an empty gun or (God forbid!) no gun at all!

Just because no one has needed a tactical reload before doesn't mean YOU won't need to know how to do it in the most intelligent way possible. And, in all reality, the way I do it may be no more sensible IN THE GUNFIGHT IN WHICH I FIND MYSELF than doing it in some other manner as described in some of the responses. No one in the gun community (especially professional trainers) wants to admit that a huge factor in a lethal force encounter is LUCK, because good training only gets you up to the point where bad luck overrides it!

 

[Coach]

I have listened in person to a lecture from John Farnum about incidents in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina where people got into gun fights with looters and did speed reloads in waist deep brown water and lost magazines as a result. It sounds to me as though reloading with retention would have been the thing, but training and habits did not allow.

 

[Vanguard.45]

No doubt that if you are in a gunfight IN A FLOOD then my approach would be inferior.

Or if you were in outer space. Need to hold on to those partially spent mags lest they begin to orbit on their own.

 

[MohawkSlim]

Mag retention isn't important when you're dead.

 

[MinuteManMike]

This strikes me as silly as saying "Well in 99% of cases, one fire extinguisher is sufficient in household fires, so only one is needed."

If I'm going to carry, I'm carrying two spare mags too. With all of the idiots on my planet, I expect to have to shoot a ton of zombies all at once any day now.