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PSA: "Active Shooter"
I've been thinking a lot about shootings...anyway, some may think it's ML being paranoid, but clearly we have a shooting problem in our nation. Therefore, I'm learning some things to do and watch out for in the even I'm in a "situation," which could totally happen.
Below is an article I discovered and I wanted to share for others to get their minds around.
My FIL, also reading up on these things, learned that only about 10-15% of people will act correctly in a situation solely because they have thought about the "what-ifs" ahead of time and have formulated some type of loose plan. The biggest problem non-planners face (besides the threat) is disbelief that it could be happening to them.
For example, on a plane...how many of us actually look to see where the nearest exit is AND how many seats away it is? In the grocery store you frequent where can you go to exit the building besides the front door? Where could you hide?
Every time I go into my Super Target, I try to learn something new about the inside.
Here's the article...
Active Shooter!!!
What do I do? How do I protect my family and loved ones? What are the recommendations? How do I get away? What does Law Enforcement tell us to do in a mass shooting? How do I not get shot if I act?
By Mark, a contributing author to SurvivalCache.com
Mass Shooting Survival Guide
It seems that the term ?Active Shooter? is now a common and unfortunate term in our society. Madmen and terrorists have taken 
advantage of our open and trusting society, twisting our 2nd amendment rights for their perverted intent on causing murder and mayhem with mass shootings. Where will this lead our society? Now more than ever, law abiding citizens need to stay vigilant and be prepared to protect themselves and their families.
The four things you must consider in an Active Shooter scenario:
1. GET OUT!!!
Keep your Situational Awareness (SA) and find an exit - Try not to draw attention to yourself. Don?t move to an exit where the shooter is focused on. Look for a window, door, primary and alternate, tertiary routes out. If you are with someone you know, take charge!!! Lead them away from the danger.
Leave everything behind ? purse, groceries, bags, etc ? those items can be replaced
When you exit ? keep your hands clearly visible and up: You do not want to be confused as a threat if Law Enforcement (LE) is already on scene
*Note: If you are a conceal carry weapons permit holder, I feel you have a duty to your fellow man to engage an active shooter assailant. A good example of this is the Trolley Square shooting. Keep in mind, you will more than likely be facing a long gun with larger capacity magazines. Depending on the situation, the element of surprise is more than likely on your side. Adequate cover and well aimed shots are a must in this situation.
2. HIDE OUT!!!
Hide out of view ? behind cover. Cover is something that will stop a bullet, concealment is something that will hide you, but not 
necessarily stop a bullet. A large oak tree is cover, leafy bushes are concealment. Many people confuse these two, do your best to get behind good cover. Unlike TV, a table, filing cabinet, chair, or bookshelf will more than likely not completely stop a bullet if at all.
Block entry to your hiding place ? barricade, lock, obstacle the door, nook and cranny where you are hiding
Stay in your hiding place and wait for Law Enforcement to arrive ? contact the authorities if you can, stay as quiet as possible. Once again, try not to draw attention to your position
3. TAKE ACTION!!!
Last Resort when in Danger ? this is obviously a last resort. Many of us are not Law Enforcement, but you might have access to something to throw, distract, or rush the active shooter using a blind corner or concealment.
Stop the Threat ? if you act, do your best to take out the threat. Once again, try to do it from a position of cover or at least concealment.
Act with Aggression ? throw items (salt and pepper shakers, ketchup bottles, tables, chairs, rocks, etc?) act decisively!!! Fortune favors the bold. If you are a CCW permit holder, you should know what to do.
4. ACTIVE SHOOTER HAS BEEN STOPPED, NOW WHAT?
Secure the Active shooters weapon and your weapon ? you don?t want to be seen as the Active Shooter by Law 
Enforcement. Beware of your environment, there maybe more than one shooter (Columbine High School Shooting).
Raise your hands ? When Law Enforcement arrives, you don?t want to create confusion.
Remain Calm
Avoid making quick movements ? don?t be a perceived threat to Law Enforcement when you exit and/or they enter the scene.
Keep your hands clearly visible and follow instructions
These are recommendations that are taught by many Law Enforcement agencies, Department of Homeland Security, the military, and many CCW courses. Remember many of us are not Law Enforcement or Vigilantes. Secure yourself, your family and loved ones by first GETTING OUT, or HIDING OUT, and only as a Last Resort ? TAKE OUT the Active Shooter.
Stay vigilant, maintain situational awareness at all times, plan for the worst, and stay survival fit ? body and mind!!!
Re: PSA: "Active Shooter"
I'm sorry, but I stopped reading at this:
Note: If you are a conceal carry weapons permit holder, I feel you have a duty to your fellow man to engage an active shooter assailant. A good example of this is the Trolley Square shooting. Keep in mind, you will more than likely be facing a long gun with larger capacity magazines. Depending on the situation, the element of surprise is more than likely on your side. Adequate cover and well aimed shots are a must in this situation.
Jesus H Christ this is terrible, terrible advice. Every law enforcement officer will tell you NOT to do this unless you are highly trained (i.e. a current or former LEO or military). Just look at what happened in Arizona with the Gabby Giffords shooting - an armed citizen very nearly shot an innocent person while trying to stop the shooter. Encouraging Joe Schmoe with a carry permit to get involved is so incredibly dangerous.
I cannot get over how irresponsible this article is.
The advice to actively engage is incredibly irresponsible and is counter to what all LE tell you to do. The article lost credibility right there.
LE train very specifically for active shooters. Playing around at your back yard range isn't the same. Reading up on it isn't the same. Yes, there are common sense things you should and could do to stay safe. But I disagree that engaging the shooter is one of them.
And before you throw out the dirty hippy card and dismiss me, I say this as a CCW permit holder and someone intimately knowledgable about active shooting scenarios.
I can suggest some great self defense based martial arts that would serve you better for everyday situations.
Clearly, it's the guy's/writer's opinion (he says, "I feel you have...") one whether or not to engage. It doesn't dismiss some of the helpful information that the article DOES contain.
Anyway, even if someone engages or not, doesn't detract from the point that more of us need to think about this sort of stuff and have a plan or an idea of where to go if we can.
It's not POS (MissyMo) just because it contains ONE opinion that some (most) disagree over.
The fact is most people don't think about this stuff at all until it's too late. And, if this article serves to pique someone's curiousity and causes them to thnk about their situational awareness, then it's served its purpose.
We will have to agree to disagree. The entire premise is ruined by the ignorance of the author.
I agree with the bolded.
But, let's think it through.
Hypothetically, you're in a store, shooter is there, JUST started. You take cover/concealment. You are also legally carrying a gun. You don't go "hunting" for the guy shooting (AKA "playing Rambo"), but if he come near you and you have a clean, unobstructed shot without leaving your cover...do you take it?
Even the best, fastest LE responses take a few minutes. By the time the 911 calls are registered, the teams assemble LE fire power, and they enter the buildling, minutes have passed...
If you can end it BEFORE LE gets there (in doing so, not interfereing with LE or endangering them), shouldn't you do it? Otherwise, more people will die. These shooters are essentially hunting people to kill.
Isn't this a case-by-case basis? Yes, I agree taking a shot at an active shooter in a stampede or a crowd is senseless, or in the dark is senseless too, but if it's just you and him (and he doesn't know you're there) don't you do it?
I don't think an overarching "no" response to killing an active shooter is the best one.
According to my husband, who has his CCW, the answer is no. At least not in our state. Now take this with a grain of salt because I do not have my CCW and have not taken the class, but according to him the law is that you can only shoot if YOUR life is directly being threatened. Not to be a "hero" or to stop a mass shooting, just to save yourself if the shooter points directly at YOU, or your minor children.
In 95% of cases, I would agree with you.
I hate dwelling on the 5% of cases, but it's hard not to. In the case of Aurora, returning fire would have been nuts and only added to the chaos and possibly to the casualties. On the flip side is Virginia Tech, where it's not completely unreasonable that someone armed and trapped in one of the classrooms could have returned fire and at least slowed the shooter down.
The only cases where engagement makes sense are situations where the shooter has a group of people cornered, such as a locked classroom. Sprees that last for minutes, not seconds. Even then, the intention should be to stall or deter, not neutralize.
Of course, there is the "no jury would ever convict you" principle in play. That and "Was he pointing at you?" "Yes." "Ok, seems legit. Sign here, please."
"Stall or deter, not neutralize." I agree and think your post is a good response.
I do have a question on this quotation, though. For lack of a better descriptor (so sorry), isn't a "wounded animal more dangerous than a dead one?"
If these shooters are as crazy as they are made out to be...wouldn't being shot but not killed just emblazen an already crazed shooter?
This is a struggle for me. I don't carry. But, if I did and I could stop a shooter, before LE arrived (knowing in doing so more lives would be saved in those lag minutes before LE arrived), from a secure place, with a clear, well-lit shot, then I think I would take the shot and I would aim appropriately to neutralize.
It's totally a case-by-case basis. Interestingly, I have posed this same question on another online forum I frequent and have gotten a huge set of vastly different responses from mostly males who have LE and military background.
Speaking as a LEO, I can assure you that we are not trained to "neutralize" anyone. We are trained to "stop the threat" and trained to aim for the largest target ie the chest area. Shooting someone in the arm, hand, foot, leg, etc. does not necessarily stop a threat. Also, if you've never actually handled a gun, you have no idea how difficult it would be to actually be so acurate as to shoot someone in the arm, hand, etc. in an active shooter situation. Unless you are an expert marksmen than this is nearly impossible when you add adrenaline, nerves, fear, etc. to the mix. We train on the regular and trust me, 9 out of 10 people could never "shoot the gun" outta someone's hand. I think people watch way too much tv and movies and this is where they get these ideas. This is another reason I have such a big problem with CCW out there. Most people who have CCW don't have ANYWHERE NEAR the amount of training necessary to carry a weapon in public. There is so much more to it than just being able to fire a gun. A large part of it is decision making and this is where I think a lot of people fall short. I could go on and on about this but I'll just end it here.
I'll add one more thing, "stall or deter" is ABSOLUTELY NEVER a reason to pull out a gun and fire at someone. A gun should only be used in life threatening situations and I assure you, you will never be trained to shoot someone just to stall or deter them. If someone is firing upon you with a gun, why on God's earth would you just want to "stall or deter" them? Deadly force is usually met with deadly force. Have you ever heard the term, "Never bring a knife to a gun fight". Truer words have never been spoken.
http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/human_nature/2011/01/friendly_firearms.html
The new poster boy for this agenda is Joe Zamudio, a hero in the Tucson incident. Zamudio was in a nearby drug store when the shooting began, and he was armed. He ran to the scene and helped subdue the killer. Television interviewers are celebrating his courage, and pro-gun blogs are touting his equipment. "Bystander Says Carrying Gun Prompted Him to Help," says the headline in the Wall Street Journal.
But before we embrace Zamudio's brave intervention as proof of the value of being armed, let's hear the whole story. "I came out of that store, I clicked the safety off, and I was ready," he explained on Fox and Friends. "I had my hand on my gun. I had it in my jacket pocket here. And I came around the corner like this." Zamudio demonstrated how his shooting hand was wrapped around the weapon, poised to draw and fire. As he rounded the corner, he saw a man holding a gun. "And that's who I at first thought was the shooter," Zamudio recalled. "I told him to 'Drop it, drop it!' "
But the man with the gun wasn't the shooter. He had wrested the gun away from the shooter. "Had you shot that guy, it would have been a big, fat mess," the interviewer pointed out.
Zamudio agreed:
When Zamudio was asked what kind of weapons training he'd had, he answered: "My father raised me around guns ? so I'm really comfortable with them. But I've never been in the military or had any professional training. I just reacted."
The Arizona Daily Star, based on its interview with Zamudio, adds two details to the story. First, upon seeing the man with the gun, Zamudio "grabbed his arm and shoved him into a wall" before realizing he wasn't the shooter. And second, one reason why Zamudio didn't pull out his own weapon was that "he didn't want to be confused as a second gunman."
This is a much more dangerous picture than has generally been reported. Zamudio had released his safety and was poised to fire when he saw what he thought was the killer still holding his weapon. Zamudio had a split second to decide whether to shoot. He was sufficiently convinced of the killer's identity to shove the man into a wall. But Zamudio didn't use his gun. That's how close he came to killing an innocent man. He was, as he acknowledges, "very lucky."
To clarify, I used the term "neutralize" as a euphemism for "kill" or at least shoot. As in "the threat has been neutralized."
Regarding stalling/deterring, I was specifically thinking of the barricaded classroom situation that occurred at Virginia Tech. A single shot fired from the classroom certainly could have made the shooter in that case think twice.