Survive a mass shooting: Run-Hide-Fight

I think "prepping / survival" should cover all the most basic crisis scenarios. While planning for an astroid strike or WWIII may be interesting and useful intellectual exercises, the more immediate scenarios are much more likely, and much more profitable to contemplate. Along with plans for dealing with a house fire, the loss of job, and a hazmat spill in your neighborhood, an active shooter scenario is worth contemplating-- especially if you have school age kids or work near a large attractive 'public space.'

Most folks who are concerned about a mass shooting have already heard a version of this. Here are my own notes.

Run
-leave the source of danger. Don’t try to get a better view

-leave by a different door than you came in. Seriously, there was a huge israeli study a couple of years ago and the big take-away from their research is that the survivors generally left by a different door than they came in. Casualties were generally leaving through the SAME door they entered. The researchers were not sure why this was the case, but suggested that shooters may plan to attack people as they flee through the most obvious exit. So leaving a different way means you won’t be with as large of a crowd perhaps.

-Put as many corners between you and the shooter(s) as possible. Don’t run straight down a long hallway and make a steady target in a shooter’s scope. This means leaving the building and not running across a large yard or playing field. Go around a corner.

-leave the property. Run and keep on running. Go take refuge in a different building, enter a private home if you have to. It’s OK for the people there to call the police.


Hide
-only do this if you have exhausted all possibility of running away. Running is your best hope

-Turn out lights, lock doors, and otherwise make your part of the building look as unused as possible. Shut off monitors and work stations. Turn off bathroom lights.

-move to a part of the room where you cannot be seen through a window or through the glass part of a door.

-lock any entryways. If the killer cannot see you, he probably cannot kill you.

-Hide someplace where a killer in a hurry won’t have time to investigate; or motive, for that matter, if he didn’t see which way you went. A closet you can lock, a basement full of pipes and storage. A warehouse or garage (that might have weapons you can improvise). One strategy that has saved lives is to got an an elevator and stop it using the emergency stop between floors. In sum, the perp is not going to invest huge amounts of time, and the opportunity to kill lots of victims, in finding you.

Fight
-When run and hide are no longer possible.

-find a weapon. Anything is a weapon; because your mind is the only true weapon; the material is merely an object you leverage to win. A full soda that you throw at the attacker to knock him off balance. An aerosol can of bug spray. A fire extinguisher shot in his face. A broom handle to his gonads. Fight dirty. win. Use surprise and your sense of desperation. Don’t just punch to contact your assailant—punch through him. Nothing is more surprising than the attack without mercy. As Mike Tyson said, “everybody has a plan until he gets punched in the face.” Win.

Carrying concealed and eliminating the shooter would my 2nd best outcome.
1st is having several people who carry concealed eliminating the shooter.

a reply to: Graysen


Respond: Return fire......

originally posted by: infolurker
a reply to: Graysen


Respond: Return fire......

That is addressed in another survival thread, The risk of defending others

The run/hide/fight guidelines I posted above are actually what I teach the kids that live with me, since they cannot legally carry at school, and so might have to face the shooter with an empty hand.

Nope that way you can die with a bullet in your back. At stem high school in Colorado Castillo, Kendrick did the right thing . He died for his friends buddy definitely save multiple lives .


Don’t run, hide, fight .

Ask yourself, would you rather die on your knees or on your feet ?

Fight, fight, fight

Yes, run and clear outta there.......wid ur XDM and a pocket full of shells........a Springfield 45

Pertinent thread subject....yup, these days huh!

This is what the police teach at the college I work for.
In the class I was in (in regards to active shooters), the question was asked: What obligation do we have for the students?
The answer was: None, they are adults.

We live in interesting times.

If you can run then run if you can hide then hide and if you can fight then fight...but do whatever you choose to do AS QUICKLY AS POSSIBLE...www.youtube.com...

I am pretty sure that 25 kids all throwing egg-sized rocks at a single shooter head would take the shooter out....just one single solid shot to the bean bag and he is down.....in a Nightclub with 250 adults all throwing egg-sized rocks I think the shooter is dead before he can reload even once....not hurt but dead as a doorknob....a hail of egg-sized rocks that large and its lights out.

Just do a trial run.....put a safely padded shooter in a room with a paintball gun....but make him stop shooting the first time he takes a head shot from an egg-sized rock.

You will see what I mean.

Practice removes fear of the gunfire sounds...it dulls the flee instinct and sharpens the think process.....just run people thru this scenario in a Nighclub---on the street---at the mall---in church----in school......and then see how things go....I mean I have thrown egg-sized rocks at Watermelons to see what would happen...for all of the weapons shows we see we never see REAILTY.....show what happens when 25 12 year olds or 250 ADULTS in a Club or Mall or 50 ADULTS on the street all throw egg-sized rocks at your head at the same time remembering that simple contact has devastating impacts and is judged differently than other types of bodily damage...cerebral damage is different than bodily damage so simple hits irregardless of force will illicit meaningful impacts and affect the shooter big time..... but not to worry the skull will be shattered anyways by only a few solid hits....face lacerated eyes incapacitated teeth knocked out trauma everywhere.

"Guns???...We don't need no stinking Guns!!"

I do carry egg-sized rocks every day.

a reply to: Graysen

You forgot to add play dead, this may prove to be your best defence in a mass shooting...
Hope nobody has to find out firsthand...

originally posted by: Fallingdown
Nope that way you can die with a bullet in your back. At stem high school in Colorado Castillo, Kendrick did the right thing . He died for his friends buddy definitely save multiple lives .


Don’t run, hide, fight .

Ask yourself, would you rather die on your knees or on your feet ?

Fight, fight, fight

Someone who does heroically is still dead, if it’s family I’ll fight if it’s strangers Id rather their family be the ones in mourning than mine.

I don’t care how callous that sounds, unconditional altruism is suicide, in this case almost certainly literally

originally posted by: IkNOwSTuff

originally posted by: Fallingdown
Nope that way you can die with a bullet in your back. At stem high school in Colorado Castillo, Kendrick did the right thing . He died for his friends buddy definitely save multiple lives .


Don’t run, hide, fight .

Ask yourself, would you rather die on your knees or on your feet ?

Fight, fight, fight

Someone who does heroically is still dead, if it’s family I’ll fight if it’s strangers Id rather their family be the ones in mourning than mine.

I don’t care how callous that sounds, unconditional altruism is suicide, in this case almost certainly literally

Honesty is progressive....well done...and this is why we TRAIN....we train to control and manage our instincts...you just honestly described your own instinctual feelings....many if not most think exactly like you....however we can easily condition ourselves to change these instincst….but it takes time and it takes real change and real confidence.....as in when I go to the nightclub someone gives me 2 egg-sized rocks at the door to drop in my pockets....so I know that everyone in the place is capable of having my back....

Not everyone has been hit by a bullet but a lot of poeple have taken a rock or a hard object to the olde beanbag so they are well aware of the damages that happen instantaneously when the dome is dented....egg-sized rocksgive you a strange sense of Neolithic surety and safety..lol...lol.

originally posted by: one4all

originally posted by: IkNOwSTuff

originally posted by: Fallingdown
Nope that way you can die with a bullet in your back. At stem high school in Colorado Castillo, Kendrick did the right thing . He died for his friends buddy definitely save multiple lives .


Don’t run, hide, fight .

Ask yourself, would you rather die on your knees or on your feet ?

Fight, fight, fight

Someone who does heroically is still dead, if it’s family I’ll fight if it’s strangers Id rather their family be the ones in mourning than mine.

I don’t care how callous that sounds, unconditional altruism is suicide, in this case almost certainly literally

Honesty is progressive....well done...and this is why we TRAIN....we train to control and manage our instincts...you just honestly described your own instinctual feelings....many if not most think exactly like you....however we can easily condition ourselves to change these instincst….but it takes time and it takes real change and real confidence.....as in when I go to the nightclub someone gives me 2 egg-sized rocks at the door to drop in my pockets....so I know that everyone in the place is capable of having my back....

Not everyone has been hit by a bullet but a lot of poeple have taken a rock or a hard object to the olde beanbag so they are well aware of the damages that happen instantaneously when the dome is dented....egg-sized rocksgive you a strange sense of Neolithic surety and safety..lol...lol.

I have no idea what egg sized rocks are???
I’m imagining it’s a metaphor for balls of steel or something similar because I can’t for the life of me imagine why a nightclub would be handing out rocks at the door???

My reactions as described above are the opposite of instinct, sitting here now with no one shooting at me it’s based purely on logic. The thought of my mother crying over my coffin while a few strangers tell her they owe their life for my heroism is not a consoling thought.

Your right that I’ve had no training and I haven’t even engaged in this scenario as a thought exercise till this thread, I’m Aussie, we don’t really have enough shootings for it to enter our minds.
Hopefully I never have the opportunity to find out how I would act

originally posted by: Fallingdown
Nope that way you can die with a bullet in your back. At stem high school in Colorado Castillo, Kendrick did the right thing . He died for his friends buddy definitely save multiple lives .


Don’t run, hide, fight .

Ask yourself, would you rather die on your knees or on your feet ?

Fight, fight, fight

That all depends. In a shopping mall at Christmas, you can be in the field of fire, but no where near the shooter. Say you're at Sofa King picking out some furniture. You hear screams and then popping from the food court a hundred yards away. Frontal assault?

Same at school, during a pep rally. My kids know to leave, and thus show other survivors an exit. If everybody is leaving through 10 different exits, more will get away as the shooter keeps switching fields of fire.

Obviously, if you can close distance and engage the shooter where you have a chance of interfering with his plans, then that's great. But my kids, the younger ones, especially, are taught to flee unless they are cornered.

taking a gun from a dude when you are empty handed is pure out desperation. I know, I've done it before. SOMEONE is going to get shot in the process; or at least wreck the oak paneling.

Our current politicians want to disarm all of us so that non compliant criminals can kill us more easily.

Of course our current gun grabbers will still retain their own weapons and armed protection through it all.

originally posted by: Graysen

originally posted by: Fallingdown
Nope that way you can die with a bullet in your back. At stem high school in Colorado Castillo, Kendrick did the right thing . He died for his friends buddy definitely save multiple lives .


Don’t run, hide, fight .

Ask yourself, would you rather die on your knees or on your feet ?

Fight, fight, fight

That all depends. In a shopping mall at Christmas, you can be in the field of fire, but no where near the shooter. Say you're at Sofa King picking out some furniture. You hear screams and then popping from the food court a hundred yards away. Frontal assault?

Same at school, during a pep rally. My kids know to leave, and thus show other survivors an exit. If everybody is leaving through 10 different exits, more will get away as the shooter keeps switching fields of fire.

Obviously, if you can close distance and engage the shooter where you have a chance of interfering with his plans, then that's great. But my kids, the younger ones, especially, are taught to flee unless they are cornered.

taking a gun from a dude when you are empty handed is pure out desperation. I know, I've done it before. SOMEONE is going to get shot in the process; or at least wreck the oak paneling.

Familiarity has a lot to do with survivability...if you are familiar with the sounds of gunfire and do not panic and if you are familiar with the upsides and downsides of guns and their usage then you have an extremely high chance of surviving many situations ad also a high chance of remediating situations if you so choose...in a way the more you know the more you are responsible for going the distance and maybe taking one for the Team....lol...or maybe if its your cup of tea..running the distance.....lol...lol...and by egg-sized rock I mean literally a rock the size and shape of a chickens egg....if you don't know what I mean go find one on the ground they are free and then put a blindfold on yourself and let someone over 10 years old thrown the rock at your head as hard as they can maybe from a variety of distances...then you will "get it".

Or just do what I did...go buy a watermelon and gather 5-10 egg-sized rocks...and let fly like the wind....lol...lol...then you will "get it".

www.youtube.com...

originally posted by: NoCorruptionAllowed
Our current politicians want to disarm all of us so that non compliant criminals can kill us more easily.

Of course our current gun grabbers will still retain their own weapons and armed protection through it all.

"You can take our guns....but you cannot take our egg-sized rocks!!!"

a reply to: Asktheanimals

several people who carry concealed eliminating the shooter.

i shall ask again - as i never get coherent replies from other ATS members in previous threads

in the real world - how are the several CCL citizens going to correctly identify the criminal shooter - and not target each other - or be targeted by a second group of CCL citizens further away from the criminal

?????????????

originally posted by: ignorant_ape
a reply to: Asktheanimals

several people who carry concealed eliminating the shooter.

i shall ask again - as i never get coherent replies from other ATS members in previous threads

in the real world - how are the several CCL citizens going to correctly identify the criminal shooter - and not target each other - or be targeted by a second group of CCL citizens further away from the criminal

?????????????

This is why egg-sized rocks are better to carry ...lol...CCR...more room for correction upon error...people heal up better from rock wounds than from gunshot wounds if you make a mistake.
www.youtube.com...

a reply to: IkNOwSTuff

So you’d leave your friends, classmates and children you don’t know be slaughtered ? You never know until you’re in a situation like that.

But I’d get instantly pissed off which would rule out the flight mode and put me right in the fight mode .

Let’s say the shooting happened in a mall food court . Where children and teenagers are present .

Would you cut and run then ?

originally posted by: ignorant_ape
a reply to: Asktheanimals

several people who carry concealed eliminating the shooter.

i shall ask again - as i never get coherent replies from other ATS members in previous threads

in the real world - how are the several CCL citizens going to correctly identify the criminal shooter - and not target each other - or be targeted by a second group of CCL citizens further away from the criminal

?????????????

Bystanders with no training or plan tend to freeze in one spot and stare. Looking at what everyone else seems to be looking at is a pretty instinctive cue. People instinctively put their hands up and back.

Shooters hold a gun up, to sight along the barrel or clear obstacles like desks and railings. They also have their hands out in front of them, working the action or clearing jambs. They also tend to stare at their own gun somewhat, especially if it is giving them trouble like jamming or with the upper receiver locked open (empty magazine).

The perp is usually looking around, while everyone else runs. Cops and other intervenors will tend to lock on him. You can think of it as one actor and multiple reactors focused on his behavior.

Multiple perps is always chaos. When there are a lot of collateral casualties, it is almost always from multiple purpetrators.