Monday, May 06, 2013

Retention Holsters

Michael Bane makes the point that the reason the Vermin from Boston didn't get a second pistol during their terrorist escapade is that they didn't know how to operate a retention holster.
Instead, they went to the one firearms superstore where they were sure guns would be in stock...they walked up to the police car of MIT Officer Sean Collier, killed him in very cold blood and tried to grab his gun. The reason those lovable Holden Caulfield-esque urchins failed on that task was that apparently the Islamic Terrorism 101 class on the Internet doesn't include retention holsters, disabling of. Don't worry...I'm sure the curriculum will be updated any moment now!
Sean Collier was ambushed and killed in his police cruiser because the killer vermin needed another pistol, so it's easy to ambush a police officer and take his pistol.  Except they couldn't figure out how to get it out of the retention holster.  Officer Collier gave the last full measure of devotion without even knowing that he was keeping his gun out of the hands of vermin, simply because he used a good holster.

Which is exactly why I ordered a new retention holster last week.  It should be in early this week and after I wear it a week or so, I'll review it.  Gun retention is very important and a good retention holster helps keep the gun on your side.  Even if you are dead.

1 comment:

Rivrdog said...

Maybe it's time to dig up all those old police training videos of the cons in the prison yards practicing the moves for snatching guns from supposed-Level 3 retention holsters, and breaking Kydex holsters off the officers' bodies.

They might have fixed the Kydex holsters by now, but how many of the early ones are still in use, with their owners believing in their magical powers to retain their pistols?

If you spend 10 hours on the range shooting for accuracy and practicing your draw/present, you ought to find at least an hour to spend in the dojo with an experienced instructor, your belt and holster, and a Red Gun. You practice your retention moves, and get to see what the latest twists are on gun-snatches.

Another little known fact: almost all States will recognize any attempted gun-snatch as a murder attempt, so you have automatic justification to resist the snatch, take two steps back and draw/fire with a shoot-to-kill mindset.

This entire subject is almost totally ignored by the concealed AND open carry people. In fact, it is only ever covered at all by policing agencies, and amongst them, only covered well by those few departments featuring actual martial artists on the Training Staff. I was lucky, MY S.O. had not one, but TWO 3rd-Dan martial artists on staff, and both of them took the pains to get very well trained in gun retention and pass it along to we Deputies.