Back to Front Sight - March 2003
Jerry and Randy "layer up" and get ready for the last day of class.
When it does rain in the desert, you'd better be prepared.
If possible, you should avoid outdoor activities where you might
encounter cold, rain, wind, and sleet. If you are attending a 4 Day
Tactical Shotgun class at Front Sight, Nevada you go outdoors, suck it up,
and TRAIN! The extended weekend of March 14-17 was atypical (for those
in Manassas, "atypical" means strange or unusual) in that the hot, dry desert
we've grown to know and love was dumped upon as the clouds rolled in from
California and unleashed torrents of water for three of the four days.
This is what the desert looks like when it rains.
"Relay 1" comes back from a shooting exercise. Rangemaster
Larry Renner demonstrates a shotgun technique.
Slugs on the left. Buckshot on the right.
A tactical shotgun class is not about shooting at clay
targets that fly through the air. The word tactical, though overused,
comes from the word "tactics" and refers to how the shotgun may be employed
at different ranges under different conditions. The pictures above
show the accuracy of slugs at 50 meters. This isn't too surprising
because hunters often get much better accuracy. The picture on the
left shows shots fired after a "slug exchange." In this instance, the
round in the shotgun's chamber is not a slug and needs to be, and you have
to make the switch in a couple of seconds then fire as soon as the sights
line up. Each of these hits would have been effective.
The second picture shows a risky yet possible technique of hitting a hostage taker (standing behind a hostage) with buckshot at 7 meters. Notice that the "hostage" was not hit. This can also be done in a very short time. The hostage may be struck by plastic or other smaller objects, but as long as the buckshot pellets hit the bad guy, that's ok.
Lessons Learned. You do not have to have a super "tactical shotgun" with a side saddle shell holder and a "tac sling." You don't even need adjustable ghost ring sights to make these kinds of hits every time. You do need a shotgun, of course, but the rest is training. The best shooter in the class had an old Remington 870 with the front sight from a Remington 700 rifle and a Williams rear peep sight that came off a Ruger .22 rifle. A Mossberg 500 does as well as a 590 once you've mastered it. One of the best shooters in the class had an old Browning auto shotgun that loaded and ejected through the same port.
If you reload behind cover, you can carry shells in all kinds of places and do not have to lug around the extra weight of shells on a side saddle. By the way, if you do use a side saddle, put the shells in it with the bases of the shells pointed up. This is not as fast, but the shells won't fall out either.
If you need to use the shotgun, your support side elbow should drop down through the sling and get the sling off of your shoulder so that you are just holding the gun. The tac sling is handy if you have to let go of the shotgun for some reason and "transition" to a pistol. In the real world, few people ever have to do that. Slinging the shotgun muzzle down on the support side, the same way African hunting guides carry rifles, works fine.
Trap shooters and hunters can take their time loading a shotgun. In a "tactical" situation, you don't have that luxury. You need to be able to reload the gun when empty, or when there's a lull in whatever is happening, and do this without looking at the gun. Hunters may get angry if a gun malfunctions, but a real malfunction in the real world can be far worse, so part of the training covers how to clear malfunctions. One of the more difficult malfunctions is a double feed - two shells competing for the same space in the gun. This is also a bear of a problem with a pistol. With the shotgun, you have to drop to one knee and bang the butt of the stock into the ground until the offending round, or both, fall out. This is exciting when you forget your knee pads and are wearing shorts.
The tactical shotgun course includes a number of other interesting exercises, and there is the inevitable skills test at the end of the class. The weather was a terrible distraction, not the rain so much as the cold. Rain just falls off a good coat and doesn't bother a shotgun either. Cold windy weather, when you are expecting to be out in the desert in a hot dry setting, can be annoying. Several of the students in the pistol and rifle classes dropped out because of the cold. Our planned "wear shorts and sunscreen" weekend turned into something unexpected, a rare experience of winter weather in the Nevada desert.
One of the very important lessons, and one I've not memorized quite yet, is that shotguns have zones of effectiveness. At very close range, as in a dwelling, regular #9 birdshot works well. As you move away, buckshot is more effective because of the fewer number of larger projectiles (9 pellets in regular '00 buck" and 8 pellets in the reduced recoil loads). Once the buckshot pattern cannot be contained on a target, you switch to slugs and this can occur at 35 meters and continue as far out as your shotgun can hit a target with a high degree of certainty. I had very little experience with slugs or buckshot prior to this class. Slugs made a weird noise when fired, a lower pitched ".38 Super" type sound - which may make sense to some of you who go to IPSC matches. I can't remember what buckshot sounds like because I was always trying to hit the hostage taker and not hit the hostage when I fired buckshot, or was involved in a contact distance shot with the shotgun off the shoulder tucked under the firing side elbow.
The second picture shows a risky yet possible technique of hitting a hostage taker (standing behind a hostage) with buckshot at 7 meters. Notice that the "hostage" was not hit. This can also be done in a very short time. The hostage may be struck by plastic or other smaller objects, but as long as the buckshot pellets hit the bad guy, that's ok.
Lessons Learned. You do not have to have a super "tactical shotgun" with a side saddle shell holder and a "tac sling." You don't even need adjustable ghost ring sights to make these kinds of hits every time. You do need a shotgun, of course, but the rest is training. The best shooter in the class had an old Remington 870 with the front sight from a Remington 700 rifle and a Williams rear peep sight that came off a Ruger .22 rifle. A Mossberg 500 does as well as a 590 once you've mastered it. One of the best shooters in the class had an old Browning auto shotgun that loaded and ejected through the same port.
If you reload behind cover, you can carry shells in all kinds of places and do not have to lug around the extra weight of shells on a side saddle. By the way, if you do use a side saddle, put the shells in it with the bases of the shells pointed up. This is not as fast, but the shells won't fall out either.
If you need to use the shotgun, your support side elbow should drop down through the sling and get the sling off of your shoulder so that you are just holding the gun. The tac sling is handy if you have to let go of the shotgun for some reason and "transition" to a pistol. In the real world, few people ever have to do that. Slinging the shotgun muzzle down on the support side, the same way African hunting guides carry rifles, works fine.
Trap shooters and hunters can take their time loading a shotgun. In a "tactical" situation, you don't have that luxury. You need to be able to reload the gun when empty, or when there's a lull in whatever is happening, and do this without looking at the gun. Hunters may get angry if a gun malfunctions, but a real malfunction in the real world can be far worse, so part of the training covers how to clear malfunctions. One of the more difficult malfunctions is a double feed - two shells competing for the same space in the gun. This is also a bear of a problem with a pistol. With the shotgun, you have to drop to one knee and bang the butt of the stock into the ground until the offending round, or both, fall out. This is exciting when you forget your knee pads and are wearing shorts.
The tactical shotgun course includes a number of other interesting exercises, and there is the inevitable skills test at the end of the class. The weather was a terrible distraction, not the rain so much as the cold. Rain just falls off a good coat and doesn't bother a shotgun either. Cold windy weather, when you are expecting to be out in the desert in a hot dry setting, can be annoying. Several of the students in the pistol and rifle classes dropped out because of the cold. Our planned "wear shorts and sunscreen" weekend turned into something unexpected, a rare experience of winter weather in the Nevada desert.
One of the very important lessons, and one I've not memorized quite yet, is that shotguns have zones of effectiveness. At very close range, as in a dwelling, regular #9 birdshot works well. As you move away, buckshot is more effective because of the fewer number of larger projectiles (9 pellets in regular '00 buck" and 8 pellets in the reduced recoil loads). Once the buckshot pattern cannot be contained on a target, you switch to slugs and this can occur at 35 meters and continue as far out as your shotgun can hit a target with a high degree of certainty. I had very little experience with slugs or buckshot prior to this class. Slugs made a weird noise when fired, a lower pitched ".38 Super" type sound - which may make sense to some of you who go to IPSC matches. I can't remember what buckshot sounds like because I was always trying to hit the hostage taker and not hit the hostage when I fired buckshot, or was involved in a contact distance shot with the shotgun off the shoulder tucked under the firing side elbow.