Speaking of ninjas invading your home
In the various threads about flash lights, lasers, position, and whether or not my family is comprised of midgets in need of interior decorators, a few folks make one helluva good point. If the bad guys invade your home, stay put in the bedroom with your door shut, point the gun you have with largest barrel at the door, and call 911.
Great plan, really. But . . .
Among the alleged midgets in my house are two children, which are about as close to midgets as we get. Their bedrooms (in need of the aforementioned decorating) are on the opposite side of the house. Am I gonna sit in my bedroom, on the phone, and call 911 when someone is checking out the house? No. The Mrs. can do that. I’m going to go get my children. And, at that point, I’m not going to be all that concerned about giving away my position.
October 25th, 2011 at 1:08 pm
And you will be able to walk through your house, either with the lights on or off, without tripping over the big wheel in the kitchen, the pile of action figures in the front hall, the Playstation wires crossing the living room floor, and the mysterious pile of clothes outside the kid’s rooms. Anyone entering with ill intent will have to navigate those obstacles, cursing their stubbed toes and making noise as they fall over the unexpected caltrops and ambuscades of everyday life in a home with children.
October 25th, 2011 at 1:21 pm
Fantasy role-playing.
If a team of operators sets up a defensive parameter in my living room and stealthily waits for me to come into their trap, well, they got me. Which they could have done by storming my bedroom wearing their body armor, shooting me through the door with their AR15s, or just shooting my house with their 50 cal from the street. Who worries about such make believe?
If somebody has come into your house with a gun and the specific intention of killing you – waiting for the police is dumb. Dead dumb. Best move may be to jump out a window.
You don’t have a kill zone in your house, or a funnel of death. You aren’t rich enough to have a house built into a decommissioned missile silo, or even a castle. Your house is built from fast-growth wood covered with paste, paper, and paint. If you think somebody is hiding behind a corner of your home with a gun, shoot them through the dry wall. Shoot them through the hollow interior door.
If somebody has come into your house with the causal intention of killing and stealing and hurting, then holing up is also stupid. Orient, observe, decide, act. Waiting for them to finish being distracted by whatever, letting them sober up a little more won’t help you.
As far as balancing the risks – one could take your car keys or garage door opener to bed. Setting off the car alarm or the garage door will be a momentary distraction while you shoot them. Walmart also sells remote-control power-strips.
October 25th, 2011 at 1:26 pm
Unc, that’s because you have had a dose of reality. Most of these keyboard kung-fu artisans have never considered anything like that. They have never actually tried to clear their house in the dark for practice, they have never had any formal training for situations like that.
My duty is to my family first and foremost. Currently I can try and hold up in a fixed position, however tactically that isn’t as great as it sounds. Plus the cavalry won’t arrive for about 15-20 minutes where I live. Instead my wife and I train regularly on clearing the house as a two man team with me on point and her covering my flank and six. Our house layout is a single story and is easily cleared in a linear fashion.
No plan survives first contact with the enemy(reality). The bottom line is you need to have multiple methods and tools to deal with a multiple scenarios that are the most likely to happen. Most likely is someone breaking in to steal stuff. Least likely is a tactically trained ninja.
October 25th, 2011 at 1:49 pm
If somebody wants to kill me, all they have to do is tell the SWAT team that I’m holed up with guns. Burglars are a different matter.
October 25th, 2011 at 2:02 pm
Our 2nd floor is bedrooms and bathrooms. The stairway is right outside our master bedroom. In a break in situation, I cover the stairs, and DW calls the police while heading to the boys room to round up the three of them. Depending on the situation, she will be bringing them back to our room (better defended then rest of the upstairs). All while I stand at the top of the stairs and yell down that I am armed and the Police are on the way.
Smart switch at the top of the stairs turns on ALL of the downstairs lights, as well as the upstairs hallway.
October 25th, 2011 at 2:06 pm
Exact same situation in my place, Uncle. I live in a giant L with my room being at the lower right and the girls’ bedrooms at the top. The entrance to the house is at the crook of the L, putting anyone breaking between my children and I.
I need to be able to see clearly, not to avoid obstacles (the dog toys alone should be enough to break ankles) but so that I can ensure that my rounds are not going toward my children.
Hell, my house isn’t light tight. The streetlights and all the LED’s from the Wii / TV / Coffee Maker / etc provide enough night-damaging lumens that a flashlight ain’t gonna do much more than clarify.
October 25th, 2011 at 2:20 pm
@ dustydog
+1
October 25th, 2011 at 2:47 pm
If you think somebody is hiding behind a corner of your home with a gun, shoot them through the dry wall. Shoot them through the hollow interior door.
Which works great until it’s one of said midgets, running to Mommy/Daddy.
Agree with the larger point though.
October 25th, 2011 at 2:48 pm
My wife and I have chosen not to have children so that they won’t hit the living room trip wires.
October 25th, 2011 at 3:01 pm
The NRA discusses this very problem in their Personal Protection in the Home class. The step right before “Hunker down in the room” is actually “gather your family together and go to the safe room.”
The class discusses the fact that you may need to move through the house to gather the family and that you may encounter the bad guy on the way before you get to the safe room.
That brings out one advantage of the pistol and the pistol mounted light. You only need one hand to operate a pistol which leaves a hand free for opening/closing doors, turning on/off lights, or dragging or carrying your kids. If one hand is occupied with a kid, and you need a light, a gun mounted light lets you have gun and light operated with the same hand.
Just saying this problem has been acknowledged and discussed before, is all.
October 25th, 2011 at 3:25 pm
HL,
Yes but what of the State Yelling Champion? That three-toothed prick? The Queen of Sheba?
October 25th, 2011 at 3:39 pm
Drake,
They are the trip wires.
October 25th, 2011 at 4:36 pm
The nice thing about children is that they walk below the 3-pronged fishhooks I hang at eye level…
October 25th, 2011 at 4:41 pm
I agree with the original posting. It gets bad on this internet comments. There are too many saying “what if” and then going into Jason Bourne scenarios. Seal Team Six is not coming to get you. What we will encounter in our homes are garden variety burglars and crackheads. We need to have a clear, practiced plan for dealing with what really could happen.
October 25th, 2011 at 4:50 pm
Again a simple and enjoyable investment of x10 controllers would allow you to turn on which ever lights on you need and in the manner you want. Example might be turning on the kitchen, living room, then as any potential intruder is wondering why the lights are on get kids. Well, I hope it works that way.
October 25th, 2011 at 5:02 pm
And if you are prepared for Military Operators to come after you, they will probably just drop a JDAM on you instead.
October 25th, 2011 at 6:12 pm
The reality you learn, when you read a few reports of real encounters, is that the actual event is more chaotic, longer running and difficult to plan for – simply because no one knows their lines, their cues or their marks.
So keep the plans simple, easily remembered, and be prepared to improvise. But never compromise on the keys of keeping out of grappling range, never surrender your weapons and keeping the initiative.
October 25th, 2011 at 6:13 pm
HL, I assume that those trip wires are set to detonate claymore mines.
If that fails, “I say we take off and nuke the site from orbit. It’s the only way to be sure.” – Aliens
October 25th, 2011 at 7:11 pm
I live in a glass house, literally at each end and somewhat in the middle, it’s a through-and-through awiting to happen and ANYthing incoming or outgoing will involve ALL the neighbors. I would count eight but nobody lives above us.
Go to the Box O’Truth for stronger and more impact resistant boxes than the one in which I live.
Also, from what I’ve heard and read in reports, most of the nocturnal freelance home-inspectors are so drugged or otherwise intoxicated that all manner of lights and loud noises (including yelling, let alone shotgun racking) have very little actual effect on whatever their decision making process is, that is already set in motion.
I’d just flip on ALL the lights, lock our doors, and hope they find the beer in the ‘fridge.
October 25th, 2011 at 7:48 pm
What ifs can never cover the reality… And no one knows what they will actually do until the encounter the situation.
October 25th, 2011 at 7:57 pm
On a slightly related note… my understanding is that a significant fraction of home invasions begin with the attacker simply knocking on the front door, and forcing his way in as it is opened. Not many people are prepared to deal gracefully with that situation.
We had one murder here, years back, where the attacker approached the front door with an empty cardboard box and a clipboard, claiming he needed a signature. Most folks are sitting ducks for that sort of thing. This is one of the few situations, IMO, where a handgun is better than a long gun as a home defense weapon.
October 25th, 2011 at 8:28 pm
“You don’t have a kill zone in your house, or a funnel of death.”
What about that staircase?
October 25th, 2011 at 9:52 pm
#22 My house in CA actually did have a relatively optimal staircase for such purposes. It had straight line-of-sight to the front door, and clear audio to the entire first floor for announcing armed status to any intruder.
My current place in Vegas is not nearly as defensible, but the better laws do compensate should that day come.
October 25th, 2011 at 9:58 pm
Barron,
It would be great if your wife could convince mine of the necessity for such training. Sadly, she does not find my arguments convincing.
October 25th, 2011 at 11:54 pm
A few posts from Oleg come to mind.
First being this one.
Oleg also did another post on this exact subject, but now I can only find a small version of the picture.
The necessity of the training is so you each become familiar with the behavior and actions of the other in a safe environment. Making sure you don’t sweep each other, that one is properly covering the other, and in doing so how to move together as a team.
October 26th, 2011 at 12:27 am
With childern you have no choice but to go and get them. Everyone has a different situation to address. When things go bump in the night having a large aggressive dog is a good thing. Even a tiny noise maker raising hell is better than none.
October 26th, 2011 at 8:25 am
HL,
They may drop JDAMs, but how will they know it is not the decoy house? Wait…. can government agents view this site?…… It is the real house…. I was just joking about having a decoy house…. Nothing to see here.
To the other commenters…. did I ever tell any of you the ode-cay to my unker-bay ntry-eay oor-day?
October 26th, 2011 at 9:37 am
Like many above, my entrance to the master bedroom is past all the kids bedrooms. I can access my 4 infra-red video cameras from my Iphone. So I would just look around and see what’s up. These systems are getting better and cheaper and hook right into the home WiFi.
I plan on adding 2 cameras outside next year, and having them take the place of security lighting. They use less electric, too.
October 26th, 2011 at 1:26 pm
@Beaumont,
Via email from Oleg this morning here’s the full image.
You can try the line, “See, Oleg say’s it’s a good idea.” Along with, “See, other people are doing it too!” I got my wife into shooting while we were still dating. She doesn’t love it nearly as much as me, I’m like Benny and Baseball from the Sandlot, rain shine tidal wave whatever. I’ve been out on the Boomershoot line with 30mph winds and freezing rain. The wife is a bit more of a “fair weather” girl.
October 26th, 2011 at 6:08 pm
When I joined the discussion on TTAG and suggested that it might not be a bad idea to turn on all of the lights in the house the only response was sarcasm. (Not that I mind, I think there is a decent mix of good snark, bad snark, and helpful responses).
True, people in their own homes are used to navigating around in the darkness. We all have a pre-sleep snapshot of the more or less fixed objects throughout our homes, but I don’t think anyone catalogs the exact positioning of stuff like toys, ottomans on wheels, pets, etc, every night right before bedtime.
Lighting everything up might be overall more helpful to a defending homeowner.
Anyone agree/disagree?