Active Threat Survival Essentials
The following article is taken from our new Active Threat Survival Essentials course, now available on our partnered platform the Iron Survival Network. Click below to access the full course. The course features interactive video lessons using footage of real-world attacks and teaches the most critical concepts and techniques for surviving a deadly encounter.
The tragic rise in active threat events (deadly attacks) has led to a great deal of effort towards finding effective countermeasures and solutions. Unfortunately, many of those efforts have met with limited success. At least recently, a huge collection of organizations, companies and special units have emerged with the intention of countering the active threat problem. However, the sad truth is that many of these initiatives, while possibly well-intentioned, are more effective at making money or advancing careers than they are at solving problems. Therefore, the result is that the vast majority of literature, courses and supposed wisdom that has emerged in the field of active threat response is essentially “fluff” that often misses the most critical points and concepts that could help save lives in a real emergency.
The new Special Tactics Active Threat Survival Essentials course intends to take the opposite approach. To give citizens, security personnel and law enforcement officers the most simple, essential, commonsense tools and concepts that will have the most direct impact when it comes to saving lives. What does this mean exactly? In what ways are most other courses and organizations not already accomplishing this?
Run, Hide, Fight? What’s Missing?
One of the most common paradigms currently associated with active threat courses is the simple guidance of “run, hide, fight” as the three possible courses of action that innocent people can take when facing a deadly attacker. There is nothing wrong with this model and it actually forms the basis for our own course. However, the way that run, hide, fight is taught and understood in many other courses often leads to problems. First, in some cases people misunderstand that you must run… hide… and fight in that order. In reality you may need to do all three of these things in many different combinations. When the attack starts, you may not be able to escape and might have no choice but to hide. If the threat finds you, there is no choice but to fight. If you prevail, you will need to run to safety or to another hiding place. Thus, run, hide, fight is not a fixed formula but must be free-flowing, flexible and adaptive.
Perhaps even more important is the fact that many courses do not communicate the most essential points when it comes to how to run, hide and fight. There is now unfortunately a vast amount of data to show how citizens, security personnel and law enforcement officers actually react in an active threat situation. Even people who have attended active threat training make what can only be called inexcusable mistakes. These mistakes prove that training either did not adequately cover key points or did not encourage students to physically practice/rehearse actions to ensure they became second-nature under stress.
A training course might teach students to “run” but does it explain that it is critical not to run in a straight line but rather to move in a zig-zag or serpentine pattern? Real-world experience and data proves without doubt that doing so greatly enhances the chances of survival. More importantly, do students in a course practice running in this way when they hear shots fired? If they practice, do they practice just once or multiple times under realistic conditions. Under extreme stress can you really be expected to remember to run in a zig-zag if you have not practiced multiple times?
Training courses might teach students to hide but how many emphasize the importance of cover and concealment. There are countless videos and reports that show people taking cover behind objects that will not protect them. Videos show people hiding under tables or even behind flimsy objects like luggage trollies. People who are not properly trained will not naturally understand which objects will stop a bullet and which objects will not. In many cases, even supposedly experienced security personnel are seen standing out in the open when bullets are flying instead of getting behind solid cover. If the majority of training adequately focused on cover and concealment we would not see such problems.
Finally, training courses might teach students to fight, but how many emphasize and practice fundamentals like the use of improvised weapons, attacking in a group, and attacking from multiple directions? How many courses teach the correct way to barricade a door? How many courses teach students how to escape through windows and encourage organizations to emplace ropes and emergency ladders on upper floors? Even if courses teach these things, how many organizations actually keep ropes and ladders on upper floors and do employees actually know where they are and how to use them? How many organizations keep medical kits in key locations and is there adequate medical training to ensure the kits are of use in a crisis?
If you have attended an active threat course that covers and emphasizes all the example points above (or if perhaps you teach such a course) then you can rest assured that you are truly part of the solution and not the problem. However, the fact is that many of the current efforts to counter active threats do not emphasize these key points and others that we will discuss later. Thus, the training ends up being a waste of time and even worse, offers people a false sense of security. They think they are prepared for a real-world crisis when in reality they are only slightly more prepared than someone with no training at all.
The Other Missing Piece… Integration
One of the most complex challenges inherent in the active threat problem is the fact that it calls for an integrated effort between civilians, security personnel and first-responders. If there is one point that the active threat data makes extremely clear is that law enforcement officers may not arrive in time. This means that schools, houses of worship and businesses will require some sort of internal security element, either armed or unarmed to respond immediately when the shooting starts. It is not enough just to train these security personnel but the actions of security teams must be integrated with the survival training taught to innocent civilians.
Finally, when law enforcement officers or units do arrive, their actions must in turn be coordinated with the security teams and innocent civilians. If not, many things can go wrong. If security elements are armed or if there are armed citizens involved in the incident that law enforcement officers are not aware of, the officers might accidentally shoot one of the good guys. If law enforcement and security do not coordinate beforehand, the officers might waste valuable time when arriving on scene. If law enforcement and security elements are not aware of the pre-designated evacuation routes and safe havens that innocent civilians are going to use, they will not know how and where to best respond to save lives.
While there are once again some courses that address and integrate all three of these different groups of people (civilians, security and law enforcement) many focus only on one part of the problem. This means that in a crisis, the actions are likely to be disjointed, delayed and potentially dangerous. It is thus critical for any course or system to show how to integrate the plans and actions of all the various elements involved in a deadly attack. In years past, Special Tactics published three articles out of a four-part series discussing these issues. You can find them on our main block page by clicking HERE. We expect to finally publish the fourth article in the series in the coming weeks.
We hope you found this short article useful. Click below to check out our full online course covering Active Threat Survival Essentials. The course features interactive video lessons using footage of real-world attacks and teaches the most critical concepts and techniques for surviving a deadly encounter.
