FOREFRONT feature
SAFE” position at some point. In any event, carrying the pistol “OFF SAFE,” whether by personal choice or in accordance with agency policy, negates the perceived safety advantage of having a safety installed on the weapon in the fi rst place.
Hardware “Solution” #3: Increased Trigger Travel A fi nal method of trying to fi x the unin-
tentional discharge problem through equip- ment selection (and Mr. Owens’ principal suggestion) is to increase the distance that the trigger must travel to discharge the fi re- arm. It is hoped that an unintentional trig- ger pull could be recognized and arrested before it is completed, or that the uninten- tional force wouldn’t be strong enough to move the trigger the required distance to fi re. However, like the other equipment- oriented fi xes, it fails to prevent the error while introducing other problems. T e so-called Double Action/Single Ac- tion (DA/SA) and Double Action Only (DAO) triggers indicated by Mr. Owens travel about an inch (measured at the tip of the trigger, perhaps 5/8 inch measured in the center) before a round is fi red in DA mode, as compared to the roughly ½ inch of travel (measured at the tip, perhaps ¼ inch at the center) on the striker-fi red guns. T is nominal half inch of additional travel is unlikely to be noticed during an involun- tary clench response involving 25 or more pounds of force. We know this because law enforcement history is replete with examples of unintentional discharges with fi rearms equipped with similar triggers. Law enforce- ment offi cers managed to accidentally pull the long and heavy DA triggers of their re- volvers with frequency for nearly a century before they switched to DA/SA and DAO pistols in the 1980s and 1990s, and they continued to do the same with the new guns. T e long triggers on these guns couldn’t stop the problem then, and they won’t now. As previously noted, the long and heavy triggers can make the gun more diffi cult to operate and control, however, especially for offi cers with smaller hands. In fact, it was this problem that largely encouraged the wide scale shift away from DA/SA and DAO designs in the 2000s, and toward the striker-
12 The Police Marksman Summer 2015
No Glocks For Cops? An Alternative View
I’m one of a legion of fi rearms instructors
who were grateful to see the striker-fi red de- signs gain popularity, because I didn’t have to yell myself hoarse on the range continuously reminding students to “decock” their pistols when they were off target. I also appreciated the fact that it took less training time for a novice student to achieve profi ciency with the simpler, striker-fi red design that only has one type of trigger pull to master and a mini- mum of controls to operate.
This won’t intimidate any of the gun enthusiasts out there, but the large number of levers and buttons on some DA/SA designs can quickly cause confusion for novices and non-dedicated personnel.
fi red guns with their shorter trigger reach. T e latter guns were simply easier for offi cers with smaller and less powerful hands to op- erate, and we saw dramatic improvements, nationwide, in law enforcement agency shooting scores when the DA/SA and DAO autos were exchanged for striker-fi red guns like the Glock. Importantly, the striker-fi red guns were also easier to operate than the more complex DA/SA designs with their more extensive manual of arms. During the peak of DA/SA auto preeminence in American law enforce- ment, it was not uncommon for an offi cer to unintentionally fi re a shot when the pistol was in SA mode, with its much shorter and lighter trigger pull. It was also not uncom- mon for them to reholster a pistol that was still in SA mode, creating a signifi cant safety issue, or even an unintended discharge in some cases.
The Role of Negligence To this point, I’ve been careful to focus on the unintended discharges that occur dur- ing enforcement actions, and not during administrative situations (such as loading or unloading the fi rearm for cleaning, in- spection, etc.). T is is not an attempt to ignore the sizable number of unintentional discharges that occur during administrative actions, which Mr. Owens is rightly con- cerned about, but to segregate these two very diff erent situations. T e physiological and cognitive eff ects of
stress that prompt unintentional discharges during a violent encounter are the result of involuntary reactions in our minds and bodies. T ese Sympathetic Nervous System responses are automatic processes that are largely beyond our control. We can miti- gate the eff ects of these changes through various means (“tactical breathing,” expo- sure through realistic training, etc.) but we largely cannot prevent these reactions from occurring in the fi rst place. However, the unintentional discharges that occur during administrative handling are entirely preventable. T ese discharges are rooted in inattention and negligence, which are not involuntary reactions, but rather things that are fi rmly in our con- trol. Sloppy and inattentive gun handling is preventable and controllable, and must never be permitted by an agency, agency leadership, or the individual offi cer. In- dividual offi cers must be shown that they have a critical stake in fi rearms safety, and must be encouraged to develop the proper safety habits. Offi cers must understand, at a very deep and personal level, that their inattention or negligence could directly re- sult in injury or death, and that they will
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