Blame the shooter, not the gear

[The Bubba Effect]

Thanks for posting this Shay, I will use it as motivation to more closely examine the way I draw.

I don't have any experience or opinion on the Serpa or Thumbdrive, but it appears to me that the holster choice is secondary to the real issue which is that the shooter had developed a set of mechanics which properly functioned with one holster/pistol pair and reverted unintentionally to those mechanics with the second holster/pistol pair to catastrophic effect.

Would it be fair to say that the real culprit here is training with two differently configured pistols and holsters? Would it be fair to say that the choice of holsters might not be ideal, but that the holster choice only aggravated a situation ruined by mixing different pistol/holster pairs into his drills?

Do I have to pick one pistol and one holster to have and hold for better or for worse, through sickness and in health till death do us part?

 

[The Bubba Effect]

I'm convinced he had a .22 LR conversion kit installed. There's no way it was a .45 ACP because if what I read on the internet is true, it should have knocked him down or toss him 20ft through the air into the tree line.

Ahem, if you noticed, one round from the venerable .45acp stopped his attack cold. The paper remained decidedly unpunched.

 

[MilitaryArms]

I know this isn't the first time this has happened. I also know of quite a few quick draw ND's with other holsters, including more than one that happened to shooters while I was present. Every one of them, including the one on the video, appears to me to have been directly related to getting the trigger way too early, not because of pushing the release.

In the case of this incident, the finger got into the trigger guard because the design of the holster facilitated the shooter doing it by requiring downward pressure. Where he made the mistake is in making the decision to use the tip of his finger vs. the pad.

I have no brand loyalty to Blackhawk; I'm not a huge fan of most of their stuff and generally do not buy from them. I also agree the Serpa is far from a perfect design for a number of different reasons. However, if you are using it properly, which this operator by his own admission was not, it simply does not put your finger on the trigger. I also am far from being close to the "most experienced person with firearms" I know. There are many with vastly more experience, training, and knowledge than I do. That said, when I own something and have used it for years, I can generally have some idea of how it works...

And if you're using it improperly you can shoot yourself because the design allows for it. That's why it's banned from so many training courses. It's not banned because of a misunderstanding by the training staff, it's banned because of the volume of mishaps that they've encoutered. I don't believe it's a conspiracy to defame the SERPA being perpetrated by training companies across the US, I believe it's more likely the direct result of those mishaps - mishaps they've not seen with competing designs.

I've spoken to Mr. Grebner, I suspect you have haven't. He explained to me what happened to him in detail and it's exactly what trainers who have commented about the faulty design have said happens. He was very careful what he said in the video because he didn't want to be ridiculed. I will be doing a detailed video about what did happen in the near future and I have permission from him to use his video. I hope to get commentary from trainers who have banned the holsters from their ranges too, at least that's my goal.

Keep in mind, this guy admits he fumbled the release and couldn't clear the gun from the holster. Rather than stopping in a safe fashion, he continues to jerk on the gun while stabbing at the release. Serpas will NOT release if you start pulling on the gun prior to depressing the button.

...and this would never happen in a real gunfight, would it? If we fumble the draw, we can stop, call a time out, recompose ourselves, make sure we're using the pad of our trigger finger and not the tip, then resume when we think we've got things under control.

Basically, this guy has already muffed his draw, and has already screwed the pooch in another aspect by unsafing based upon the muscle memory of another holster (which curiously has garnered virtually none of the criticism the Serpa has). He hamfists the gun and the release and manages to get on the trigger WAAAAAY early and shoot himself.

What does the Safariland 6000 series holster have to do with this? Now you think the Safariland is deserving of criticism? That's a bit of a stretch I think.

Had he been using the Safariland and fumbled the draw, he wouldn't have shot himself because his trigger finger wouldn't have been applying downward pressure thereby winding up in the trigger guard after releasing it from the lock.

How a fumbled draw of a negligently unsafed weapon is the holster's fault is simply beyond me.

I think we've all said it's a combination of human error (inexperience) and a flawed design of the holster. It's a strawman argument to keep insisting we're blaming just the holster when we're not. The holster, as we've said, is a contributor to the mishap. Take either one of the two out of the equation and a discharge wouldn't have happened.

I put to you that if you looked at it objectively, there are probably as great a percentage of ND's with other holsters as with the Serpa. The Serpa gets the blame because there is this nice built in excuse with it which makes the folks that just corked a round off unintentionally feel better about themselves.

And I believe if you were being objective you would realize that countless trainers and training organizations probably aren't all wrong in their assessment the SERPA is a safety liability and thus have banned it from their ranges, or discourage their use. The fact you gloss over this tells me you're not being as objective as you think you are.

I actually agree with Shay's title to this thread, I'm just a little surprised that he and quite a few others apparently do not.

I think several of us are equally surprised that an obvious design flaw is being ignored.

 

[MilitaryArms]

I don't have any experience or opinion on the Serpa or Thumbdrive, but it appears to me that the holster choice is secondary to the real issue which is that the shooter had developed a set of mechanics which properly functioned with one holster/pistol pair and reverted unintentionally to those mechanics with the second holster/pistol pair to catastrophic effect.

The only problem with this assessment is that highly trained LEO's and military operators have experienced similar mishaps in training, it's not something that only happens to novices.

There is something about the design of the holster that compels users to use the tip of their trigger finger to release the lock when they have difficulty. I know, I have 5 SERPA holsters and have found myself doing this myself in the past. As a matter of fact, if you watch my videos you will see me with a 1911 in a SERPA leg holster, I still use one regularly.

Fortunately for me I'm fairly observant and I figured this was a very bad thing and forced myself to never do it. It took some training, lots of training, to never again do this. This was before I read the reports of AD's happening because people were using a curled finger vs. the pad.

As a side note I've found with a leg holster I'm less inclined to curl my finger. For whatever reason using a belt ride SERPA changes things and I find I struggle with not doing it more frequently. I've since stopped using my belt SERPAs and they now sit in the drawer. But my leg holster SERPA isn't as much of a problem for me, personally.

I've always known the SERPA was a poor design compared to other options like those offered by Safariland but I worked around it and have managed to avoid having an AD with one. But others haven't been so lucky. Quite a few others actually, enough to sway training organizations to ban them from use.

 

[Shay]

I titled this thread the way I did because I believe that the shooter is ultimately responsible for shooting himself.

1. He tried to go faster than his brain could lead
2. He swapped gear and guns frequently
3. He put his finger on the trigger before his gun was on target and he was ready to shoot
4. He picked a holster requiring the trigger finger to be used for something other than sitting high on the frame of the pistol or pressing the trigger

People will continue to defend the Serpa like it's their first born. Those zealots won't be changed.

To the intellectually honest among us, consider what this holster design requires you to do and if it has a greater than 0% chance of being partially responsible for the 8 or 9 shooting (that I know of) that have occurred with people using it.

 

[Coach]

I titled this thread the way I did because I believe that the shooter is ultimately responsible for shooting himself.

1. He tried to go faster than his brain could lead
2. He swapped gear and guns frequently
3. He put his finger on the trigger before his gun was on target and he was ready to shoot
4. He picked a holster requiring the trigger finger to be used for something other than sitting high on the frame of the pistol or pressing the trigger

People will continue to defend the Serpa like it's their first born. Those zealots won't be changed.

To the intellectually honest among us, consider what this holster design requires you to do and if it has a greater than 0% chance of being partially responsible for the 8 or 9 shooting (that I know of) that have occurred with people using it.

I agree with most if not all of this. I am not going to blame the holster over the shooter. I think that is the same as blaming the gun for crimes or killing people.

Never had a Serpa, won't have one because I think the lock is an answer to a non-existent problem, not because I think the design is flawed. Lots of people wreck cars that are perfectly safe.

A good video to discuss without a doubt.

 

[Shay]

I think that is the same as blaming the gun for crimes or killing people.

Really?

Guns do what they are designed to do. They punch holes in things when you pull the trigger.

This holster also does what it's designed to do. It requires pressure to be exerted inward on the release button by the trigger finger during the draw stroke. Most of the time it works great and the trigger finger lands on the slide or frame of the pistol. Some of the time (like in this video) it doesn't.

 

[Coach]

Really?

Guns do what they are designed to do. They punch holes in things when you pull the trigger.

This holster also does what it's designed to do. It requires pressure to be exerted inward on the release button by the trigger finger during the draw stroke. Most of the time it works great and the trigger finger lands on the slide or frame of the pistol. Some of the time (like in this video) it doesn't.

So I can only use my index finger to pull the trigger. As a highly evolved human I cannot hit a button and then keep the finger out of the trigger guard until the sights are on target.

Some training schools have banned it so it must be the holster. Training schools cannot be mistaken or wrong or closed minded about something.
How many people have shot themselves in the leg over the years without serpa holsters? Drawing from the holster must be the unsafe action then.
It does not require a serpa holster to do this. But it does require human error.

 

[MilitaryArms]

All those training organizations are likely conspiring against the SERPA. Who would have thunk it? Oh well, the cats out of the bag now.

God only knows there's no such thing as a faulty design. I mean, the 1972 Pinto exploding when involved in a rear-end accident wasn't really a design flaw as much as it was human error. If people were doing their part and driving responsibly, accidents and subsequent explosions would have never happened.

 

[MilitaryArms]

The Serpa holster requires the user to extend the index finger to the same general location one would index along the frame of the gun. My first thought was this is where we want the index finger if we are not intending to shoot. The user must then press a button, which is located in the same general area as the trigger group and under spring tension, to release the pistol. This button relies on spring tension to disengage the internal retention system and return the internal retention system. Again, on a static range this holster seems like a good design. Under the tense, uncertain, and rapidly evolving conditions of a force on force encounter this holster is a disaster.

The average shooter operates at about 50% to 60% of their normal functioning abilities when they are under stress. While this number is not a scientific fact, in my opinion it is a very generous estimate, based on my experience. If you disagree with it, I think we can all agree that no matter what your skill level is you will not operate at 100% during the tense, uncertain, and rapidly evolving deadly force encounter. This means that pressing a small button in the same general area as the trigger can result in the trigger finger prematurely engaging the trigger. This is due to the continuation of the extension of the trigger finger that is required to disengage the retention system, and the fact that it takes a small amount of force to press the button to release the pistol. Lets put it in motion, you are placed in a tense, uncertain, and rapidly evolving encounter with a really bad guy. You want to defend yourself with your firearm, but now due to the normal human response to this incident, you are experiencing loss of motor nerve function and only operating at a percentage of your best. You are now required to press a small button, which is under spring tension and requires a small amount of force to press in order to release your pistol. Now you are trying to press the button, pull the pistol out of the holster, and orient the muzzle toward the bad guy in one fluid motion. This results in the trigger finger entering the trigger guard and prematurely making contact with the trigger, which could result in an unintentional discharge. As the finger presses the button to release the pistol, the natural response is to follow through with the action and continue pressing the button as you draw the pistol from the holster. As the pistol comes out of the holster the ideal scenario is that the finger will contact the frame. My experience is that it does on the static range. For the reasons explained here in, when the shooter is placed under the tense uncertain and rapidly evolving force on force encounter it is another story. As a result of my test, I do not believe it is even possible for one to prevent this from occurring under the tense, uncertain, and rapidly evolving encounter. I will explain, under the tense, uncertain, and rapidly evolving deadly force encounter, one is placed under tremendous stress. The muscle group does not have the ability, or time, to relax after the shooter grips the pistol, applies force to press and release the gun from the holster. This results in the trigger finger prematurely making contact with the trigger even before your muzzle is oriented to the threat.
This test was conducted by placing individuals in force on force encounters armed with simunitions gear. Keep in mind that there is overwhelming evidence that this holster proves to be disasterous during any type of dynamic training where the shooter is placed under stress and asked to draw and shoot. The reports I have heard from other instructors is unintentional discharges during stress induced compressed times, moving drawing and shooting, and drawing to shoot from unusual positions.

Source: Blackhawk Serpa Holster - Wilson Tactical Training, LLC.

Written Feb 21st, 2011... well before the video posted by Mr. Grebner. Strange, he nails the situation perfectly.

So much for the notion he might be mistaken. It seems to me his testing and experience with the SERPA pretty much nailed the situation Mr. Grebner would unfortunately later experience first hand.

 

[Fargo]

In the case of this incident, the finger got into the trigger guard because the design of the holster facilitated the shooter doing it by requiring downward pressure. Where he made the mistake is in making the decision to use the tip of his finger vs. the pad.

So misusing a product and hurting yourself is somehow the product's fault? I'm really baffled here.

And if you're using it improperly you can shoot yourself because the design allows for it. That's why it's banned from so many training courses. It's not banned because of a misunderstanding by the training staff, it's banned because of the volume of mishaps that they've encoutered. I don't believe it's a conspiracy to defame the SERPA being perpetrated by training companies across the US, I believe it's more likely the direct result of those mishaps - mishaps they've not seen with competing designs.

Precisely. I don't see how a product that is safe when properly used is defective...

I've spoken to Mr. Grebner, I suspect you have haven't. He explained to me what happened to him in detail and it's exactly what trainers who have commented about the faulty design have said happens. He was very careful what he said in the video because he didn't want to be ridiculed. I will be doing a detailed video about what did happen in the near future and I have permission from him to use his video. I hope to get commentary from trainers who have banned the holsters from their ranges too, at least that's my goal.

Naw, I just watched his video where he said it was his fault, not the Serpas. What do I know...

...and this would never happen in a real gunfight, would it? If we fumble the draw, we can stop, call a time out, recompose ourselves, make sure we're using the pad of our trigger finger and not the tip, then resume when we think we've got things under control.

Lets see, if I'm wearing a holster for any purpose which could include serious social interaction; I generally try to make sure I'm familiar with it enough to actually get the thing to function as designed. I somehow don't think I'm alone on that.

What does the Safariland 6000 series holster have to do with this? Now you think the Safariland is deserving of criticism? That's a bit of a stretch I think.

I never said a thing about any safariland holster, it was a 5.11 thumbdrive that he says caused him to go safe-off prematurely. Once again, its in the video.

Had he been using the Safariland and fumbled the draw, he wouldn't have shot himself because his trigger finger wouldn't have been applying downward pressure thereby winding up in the trigger guard after releasing it from the lock.

Right, cause the only way people shoot themselves quick drawing is because they are pressing a Serpa button. Its never because they get ahead of themselves and get on the trigger early...

I think we've all said it's a combination of human error (inexperience) and a flawed design of the holster. It's a strawman argument to keep insisting we're blaming just the holster when we're not. The holster, as we've said, is a contributor to the mishap. Take either one of the two out of the equation and a discharge wouldn't have happened.

I didn't say you were blaming just the holster. You are blaming the holster because a guy didn't use it properly and hurt himself. I am really curious where you got your crystal ball as to what would happen in theoretical events?

And I believe if you were being objective you would realize that countless trainers and training organizations probably aren't all wrong in their assessment the SERPA is a safety liability and thus have banned it from their ranges, or discourage their use. The fact you gloss over this tells me you're not being as objective as you think you are.

Countless? And you call yourself objective. I agree that if MISUSED you can shoot yourself drawing out of a Serpa. But once again, I hold that if you misuse something, its your fault, not its fault. I've never been one to blame inanimate objects for having the temerity to be misused by a human. It is a bit too bradyesqe for me.

I think several of us are equally surprised that an obvious design flaw is being ignored.

Now, as I recall you say you've owned quite a few Serpas and never had inadvertent contact. I have had the same experience; as have everyone that I know that uses one that I've talked to about it.

If you can do it, and I can do it, and others around can do it just fine without ND'ing, I'm going to have question your "obvious design flaw" conclusion.

Best,

Joe

 

[x10]

I'm dropping out of this thread, the serpa thing falls directly into the glock thing and the 1911 thing,

Coach said it there are plenty of ND's with other holsters, and the "zealots" will walk in circles until there is no more internet.

I guess I've got lucky, I've used the serpa in 5 classes over the last 18 months and draw an presented 100's if not 1000's of times and even used it in a UPSA event last night and didn't shoot myself or anyone else

Pretty easy if you think the holster is unsafe Don't buy it, and Since it seems that the serpa users only shoot themselves then what does anyone care.

I'm going to find me a good 9mm vs. 40 debate

 

[Shay]

Since it seems that the serpa users only shoot themselves then what does anyone care.

And why would anyone want to try to prevent that?

 

[dom1104]

I am not quite sure I get the whole passions involved.

1. someone shot themselves. owie.
2. someone used a holster that some other people dont like.
3. A bunch of people blame the holster.
4. A bunch of people defend the holster.

I am sitting here thinking "wow, someone is a total idiot, he just shot himself in the leg."

I have no dog in this fight, I use Raven holsters for the range and sport and an AIWB CCC for CCW.

But if I shot myself in the nuts, I dont think I would be blaming my holster.

Just sayin.

 

[squirrelhntr]

tnx for the post. hopr ur feeln better. guns r like chain saws u need em sometimes, but they can bite u. i red about a fella who was cutting wood hit an unseen nail the saw bounced hit him in the neck cut his juggler artery. he reached in and pinched it and went to the hospital. he made it. could a ben a lot worse......

 

[Shay]

tnx for the post. hopr ur feeln better.

I'm feeling fine.

Did you read the thread? I did not shoot myself and as far as I know nobody else posting in this thread did either.

 

[HICKMAN]

the video made it on break.com


great....

 

[Demo]

I've been emailed videos of "Tex" in the past. He's comedy gold.

The only surprise is he's still alive. Forget the gear the guy is a walking safety hazard.

Beware of language:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WIdGTN4bAgI&feature=youtube_gdata_player


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cQnpQsUno3U&feature=youtube_gdata_player

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s-UbsPRzpeA&feature=youtube_gdata_player

 

[wrigleycub]

Great video! Excellent points to the OP and several others. On a side note- man he took that like a man.

 

[wrigleycub]

I've been emailed videos of "Tex" in the past. He's comedy gold.

The only surprise is he's still alive. Forget the gear the guy is a walking safety hazard.

Beware of language:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WIdGTN4bAgI&feature=youtube_gdata_player


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cQnpQsUno3U&feature=youtube_gdata_player

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s-UbsPRzpeA&feature=youtube_gdata_player

Did he just drink his..........woooooooooow! Nasty!