Packing 101: Two Pound Paperweight

The other day I was in gun shop looking around and I overheard a woman talking to a gun shop guru about carrying concealed in South Carolina. After I listened to him fill her with a bunch of garbage I had to introduce myself. We started talking and I could tell that she was new to this whole carrying concealed thing. During the course of our conversation I asked her if she carried her pistol with a round in the chamber. Her answer scared me.

She told me that she couldn't bring herself to carry with a round in the chamber. She didn't feel comfortable with it. I explained to her that modern firearms have so many safeties in them that a pistol can't "just go off". I explained how firing pin safeties and drop safeties all work to prevent discharges from the pistol being dropped. As the conversation developed she divulged that she didn't even carry the pistol with the magazine inserted into the gun. She travels to South Carolina on a frequent basis for business. South Carolina doesn't have a reciprocity agreement with Georgia. The only way for her to legally carry in South Carolina is to place the pistol in the glove-box, loaded. I explained this to her and she told me that she carried the magazine separately because she wouldn't remember to put the gun into the glove-box when she got into South Carolina. I was horrified. I immediately offered her my contact information for some training and legal education.

What this woman told me is not uncommon. In my time as a police officer I have encountered many people carrying weapons. Depending upon the situation I may ask them to allow me to remove their weapon from them. I don't do this all the time, but sometimes the voice in my head says- separate that guy from his gun, something isn't right here. Most of the time the person I am dealing with is a law abiding citizen who I apologize to for the inconvenience of removing their weapon, I explain that I support their right to be armed and that bad guys get permits too. One time I found a stolen gun doing this and another time the guy was a total "perp" who would have been ineligible to own a firearm if the court system had done its job. I digress. 

The one thing all of those people have in common is they never were carrying a loaded pistol. I can't count the amount of people who had unloaded pistols on their person. I can count, on one hand, the amount of people that actually had a properly loaded pistol on them- three. The majority of people carrying pistols carry them unloaded! I don't care about condition one, two, three, or five; if a round is not in the chamber that pistol isn't loaded. If you will hear a click instead of a bang when the trigger is pressed, the pistol is not loaded.

I hear all the reasons in the world why people don't have a loaded chamber, because I ask them. It's dangerous, I'll just rack the slide, I don't want to risk a discharge. I could go on with the excuses. Bottom line is you won't be able to get that pistol into the fight quickly if the chamber is empty.

Most gunfights we could find ourselves in will be a defensive gunfight. The bad guy will start hostilities and we will react. The chances of taking rounds and getting shot before you engage are decent. Racking the slide of an unloaded pistol while taking rounds is not something I want to do. In the half second it took you to chamber a round you could have sent two to three rounds back at the bad guy had the pistol already been loaded. 

Perhaps the fight will start hand to hand. This is a very probable scenario for a person with a firearms license. A strong-arm robbery that turns into a fight is a more likely scenario than a bad guy opening fire on you. In my opinion this scenario makes having the gun already loaded even more important. 

Let me set the stage. You get jumped by two thugs who will do whatever they have to do to accomplish their goal. You now find yourself in a vicious street fight. After a couple seconds the fight goes to the ground and they start beating you in the face, chest, and head. You now realize that if you don't do something you are probably going to die. The whole thing happened so rapidly you didn't have time to draw when they jumped you. Lying on the ground, you draw your pistol and try to rack the slide, but your weak arm is broken. You try to rack it against your belt, but you are pinned down on the ground. You are a bloody beaten mess, half conscious and weak from fighting. They take your pistol, rack a round into the chamber and shoot you in the head- you are dead.

Now let's flip the scenario around. You are on the ground a bloody beaten, half conscious mess. You draw your loaded pistol and shoot both attackers until they stop beating you. They fall to the ground, you get up. The fight has been stopped, you are seriously beat up, but likely to survive. 

The chances of being in a situation like I have described is less than one percent. You will most likely go your entire life and never be in a fight for your life. If you are unlucky enough to find yourself in that situation, be ready. An unloaded pistol is nothing more than a two pound paperweight. Carry your pistol loaded and stop making excuses.