National Tactical Invitational-XIV
By: Richard Wright
This is the 14th year
that the ATSA team has hosted the National Tactical Invitational, a
testing medium for people to test and evaluate their training and
tactics. It is not a contest, although they measure everyone’s
performance, but an event to allow you to test your abilities to
deal with various challenges presented to you over a 1-day period.
Stages 1, 2, 3, & 4 were in the
ATSA Village. This is a serious of buildings arranged into a small
town. After being very thoroughly searched, you enter into the
village, and once there, must interact with the village residents
just as you would in real life. While in the village, their will be
numerous test of your ability to deal with a number of different
situations. This year, we had 4 to work through. They were, the
Elevator Stage, the Attorney’s Office, the Check Cashing area and
the Gas Station Incident.
The Elevator Stage:
You enter an elevator. At the 2nd
floor, you depart the elevator and start down a short hall.
Lounging against a corner is a “party girl” who ask if you would
want to party. I answer in the negative and continue on down the
L-shaped hall. At that moment, Jeff, the pimp turns the corner.
Now Jeff admits to being 380#’s and literally fills-up the hallway.
I immediately stop, and reverse course towards the elevator…with
Jeff right behind me. I press the elevator button and Jeff starts
moving into my space asking why I don’t want to be with his woman.
I place my hand on him in a boundary setting position and he reacts
like he is upset. I reply that I have a bad cold and I don’t want
him to get it. I then determine that we are on the first floor and
leave. Jeff continues to follow, but I keep walking away, watching
him, until he gives-up and stops.
The Attorney’s office
While conducting business with my
attorney, a couple starts to enter the office when they are
violently pushed inside by a knife wielding person. As events
unfold, I learn that this is a domestic case, and I stand, quartered
to the knife wielder and discretely draw my gun. The knife guy is
still outside the door and has since grabbed his wife, and is now
threatening to kill her. The young man who entered with her draws
his gun, a 25 ACP and the argument is on. I call for the sheriff
and she eventually arrives and takes control of the situation. I
immediately holster my gun before she sees me. While questioning
me, she asked if I have a gun. I said yes, she then asked if I had
it out, and I said yes. When asked why, I replied that He (knife
guy) had a knife out and I was in fear my life. I then asked to
speak with my attorney. She smiled and said “OK”. The stage is
over.
The Check Cashing Stage
I was told to go around the
corner and enter a check cashing business to have some checks
cashed. As I turned the corner, I spot a young man, behind the
counter, stuffing money into a bag. I stop and ask him if he was
the check cashing person and he replied in an unnatural voice, that
he was. How he answered alerted me to the fact that something was
not quite right. At that time, another person turns the corner in
front of me, and he has a gun out. I quickly scan into the office
and see the young man also drawing a gun. I immediately step back
and run away, avoiding a gunfight against 2 men already armed.
Stage over.
The Car Wash Stage
I was told that I had a rental
car and that I needed to fill-it up before leaving on a trip. As I
went to the gas pump, a very belligerent person accosted me and
accused me of being someone who ran him off of the road. Of course
I had not, as I had just acquired the car, but there was no calming
the person down. He was so irate that he pee’d into the car, then
grabbed a club and begin to beat the car. I had already called for
the sheriff and she arrived to see him striking my car. He
continued to rant and rave and I scanned 360* and saw that someone
was trying to get behind me. I faced him and told him to leave,
which he did. The sheriff finally got everything under control and
the assailant was going to leave with no charges being filed. He
wanted to shake my hand, but I presented him with my non-dominant
hand. When he reacted in an angry manner and asked why I did that,
I replied that I had sprained it my dominant hand, earlier and that
it was still sore. He accepted that, and then went on his way.
Stage over.
General ATSA Comments and
observations: The
village provides you with numerous opportunities to draw and use
your weapon, with the attending results of chance of injury or
death, and additional legal problems. What it also provides, and
what I prefer to take home with me, is the opportunity to practice
my awareness and avoidance skills, and if, despite all my efforts I
get caught-up in the drama, the chance to de-escalate the situation
and then escape.
Pneumatic House (The Pizza
Delivery stage)
Having visited a friend out in
the wilds, I return home with a Pizza. Upon entering the doorway, I
see blood everywhere, and here voices and my buddy asking for help.
I immediate drop the pizza, move off the line and draw my gun. An
armed man immediate drops in front of me and I drop to my knee, and
fire 3 shots, 2 in the body and 1 in the head, aiming towards a
brick wall behind and to the right of the bad guy. (This also
prevented me from hitting my buddy lying right behind him, in the
line of fire. Immediately another armed villain appeared to my
right, again, 3 shots, as before, solves the problem. I am in an
open room with no cover, so I advance towards the corner (on my
right) and an armed person charges me, 2 shots drops him, then 2
people appear in the window, 1 after the other. Both were armed,
and were dispatched as before. (Failure drill).
I immediately check 6, and see
another armed intruder appear in the window behind me. I fire 1
shot, go to slide-lock, and stepping off the line of fire, reload
and fire 3 more shots before the villain retreats. It should be
noted that the targets appear for only 3-seconds. If you fail to
see and engage them, and you are exposed more than 3 seconds, then
they (ATSA Judges) presume that you are shot.
I approach my friend, who is
bleeding badly and assure him, then continue to pie the next room.
It is empty. I kneel and open the door to my left, pie that room,
and seeing that it is empty, go back and retrieve my friend, who
follows me outside. As I approach the outer doorway, I pie to the
right and see a person standing-up with his hands in the air,
looking towards the corner of the house (my right). I see a portion
of an armed person, (part of the head, the weapon, and a knee), and
fire a shot into his head, no reaction, so I shoot at his knee, and
he eventually falls down. I immediately spin 180* and see a man
with a baseball bat come around the corner. I fire 3 shots hitting
him and the stage ends.
Comments:
Movement, target identification and accurate shooting were required
here. Environmental awareness is also a requirement to always scan
for 1 more player, and rule 4, knowing what is behind your target.
Mystery Gun Stage
All of your personal weapons and
equipment is declared inoperable. To help comply with this, they
wrap you in a large bathrobe preventing access to your normal kit.
You are presented with a gun that
you have never seen. They show you how it works; provide you with a
mesh bag to carry your ammo (10 rounds of birdshot, 5 of
slugs) and a very (very) weak flashlight. You are then put
into a totally dark environment and presented with the following
story. You are visiting a friend out in the country. There is no
phone, no electricity, none of the modern conveniences. You go for
a walk and upon returning, hear your friend calling for help. Solve
the problem.
The first room is totally dark.
Loading the gun (a side-by-side, exposed hammer 12 gauge shotgun)
you look for the doorway into the next room. There are 2 entrances,
but I choose the one on the right. Opening the door, I see a person
resting against the far wall with a camera in his hand. I question
him and order him to leave. He does. I then continue to pie the
room only to find another person there with a gun. I challenge him
and he refuses to drop his gun…and he is shot. I step back into the
first room, and replace the spent shotgun shell with a fresh one,
then with a full shotgun, re-enter the room. As I am walking into
the room, a door in front-of, flies open and I see a man with an AK
standing outside the door. I move to cover, challenge him and get
non-compliance, so I select slug, and shoot him. I then retreat and
replace the slug with a fresh round, and advance towards the open
door.
I see another bad guy with a gun
pointed at my friends head. I decide to engage from within the
building (where he cannot see me) and hit him. He falls. I then
reload the spent round and approach the door. Pieing from
right-to-left, I see another bad guy crouching on the ground with a
weapon…he is shot, then another bad guy appears with a weapon,
standing next to him, and he gets shot also. Stage over.
Comments:
They are looking at how hard wired your tactics are when presented
with a new weapon to handle, in the dark, with a feeble flashlight
and a swinging ammo bag. Do you use cover? Do you step off the
line of force? Are you aware of your environment?
Standards:
This is a measure of how well you
can perform certain drills on command. You start out 4 feet from 3
turning targets, flanked by 2 no-shoot targets. Drawing and
shooting from retention, you must engage all 3 turning targets
within 3 seconds. They are looking for movement off the
line-of-force, shooting from retention, and hits-on-target.
(Accurate hits are preferred).
We run through this drill 2
times. I got off 19 shoots combined with 19 hits.
Next, you step back to 10 feet.
From here, you are to draw, move to cover, and engage all 3 targets
with 2 rounds each. You have 5 seconds. They have cover on both
your left and right. It is your choice. They are looking for quick
movement, good use of cover, no crowding of cover and accurate shot
placement (Cardiac Triangle).
The next drill was the DTI
dance. At 7 yards, the three targets will turn towards you. You
then draw and fire your gun till you get a failure-to-fire (a range
officer has placed a dummy cartridge somewhere in your magazine.
You do not get to know whereJ)
and perform a tap-rack-bang immediate-action-drill, then continue to
shoot to slide lock, reload, and fire 2 more rounds into each of the
3 targets. All times are recorded. 12 rounds total are fired. Some
people fired more than the 12, some did not move at all while others
reversed the Tap-Rack-Bang order to Rack-Tap-Bang.
The last stage here was to shoot
at a steel reactive target set such that it will not fall if all you
do is keep shooting into the center mass. This is a test of you
ability to recognize a failure-to-stop situation and take
appropriate action, which is a shot in the head. Someone fired 21
rounds and it never fell. Again, movement off the line-of-force,
accurate shooting, and a recognition that your shots into the
center-of-mass were not working is what is being observed.
L-shaped house
This is always a tough one. They
show you pictures of your family, wife, daughter and 2 sons,
Tactical Ted’s who are made-up), who are held hostage in the house.
You are returning home and hear a scream from one of them. Entering
the house you hear another. You draw your gun and begin the
search. Just to the right of the entranceway, there is a closet.
In it there is a man with a gun. Challenging him to drop the
weapon, he does. I order him out of the house, then secure the gun
and continue my search.
Pieing several rooms, the calling
for help grows. Finally, I see someone hiding beyond a shower
curtain. I see that he is wearing a white hat, but still, I need to
be cautious as I approach and pull open the curtain. It is my son,
and he has a bat with him. Being careful not to sweep him with a
gun, I tell him to follow me. I reverse direction out of the shower
area and pie down a long corridor. I saw no threat and noticed a
closed door at the end of the hall. I step into the hallway and a
few steps down the hall, the door flies open and there is a stranger
there with a gun pointed at me. I immediately step to the left,
drop to 1 knee, and aim in an upwards direction so that any rounds
that may miss, or pass through him, will hit a brick wall
immediately behind him. After 3 shots, he fell.
I then open a door on my left.
There, I see my daughter in bed. As I continue to pie the room I
see another bad guy there with a weapon. I immediately engage him,
3 shots, he falls and then pie outside a window, where another bad
guy is waiting. I challenge him, but he stays, so he gets shot. I
get my daughter ready, and she follows me out.
Before I leave cover, I perform a
tactical reload and again enter the hallway. As I enter the room at
the end of the hall, my other son burst out of the closet, almost
causing me to shoot him. I approach the closet, and see my wife in
1 corner, and as I search, I see another bad guy in the other. I
challenge him to drop the gun. He drops 1 gun, but retains another
so I engage him till he falls.
I then lead my family outside.
Stage over.
All my shooting on the reactive
targets is failure-to-stop shoots, typically 2 and 1, but sometimes
3 and 1. This seems to work quite well, as well as the movement off
line and the dropping to my knee. I believe that anytime one is
searching in a house the dropping to the knee to allow the shots to
go in an upward trajectory, makes a lot of sense because we never
get to know what is behind the next wall; friend of foe.
360* Range
In this stage, you escort your
son into a building that does top secret government work. You are
allowed to wait in the lobby while he goes through the interview
process. While you are sitting there, an explosion goes off with
debris falling on you. Getting up, you call for your son. No
answer, so you start a search.
In stead of going through a
doorway to my immediate right, labeled “Employee’s only” I elected
to go through an open doorway because I could already see in three
directions. Since I did not know where he was, I decided that the
best approach would be to start at the end of the hall to my right.
Turning down the hall, I entered the far room, and no one was
there. As I turn an armed person pops out and I am forced to shoot
him till he falls.
I then proceed to where I came
into the hall and turn right (straight down the hall from my waiting
room). I proceed to the end and pie the corner. I see a zigzag in
the hallway and a door marked exit. I rush to there, and confirm
that it is unlocked. There I see an armed guard, present my
credentials, and he and I agree to continue our separate, missions.
Reversing direction, I pie the next corner to my right, I can see an
armed man through the open window of an adjacent office and shoot
him. I then pie around the next office, and see a man standing
there with C4 strapped to his chest. I immediately engage him by
shooting him in the head twice), he falls. The bomb does go off. I
secure my injured son, and retreat to the exit, leaving the
building. (The video shows that I did shoot him before the bomb
exploded, but point made. I had not seen, nor recognized the threat
for perhaps a ½ second too long. I will know better the next time).
Rifle Range
Hear we are at an outdoor rifle
range. We start behind a blue tarp, and are told that once we enter
through the opening, we would see terrorist at different ranges. We
had to either knock them down (the 2 closer ones) or hit them twice
(They were steel backed and would “clang” when hit).
I sprinted through the doorway,
and saw a wall about 20-25 yards ahead. Beyond the wall, and
towards the left, were 2 tango’s among several civilian people.
Arriving at the wall, I draw my gun and pie on the right side and
see a tango. The first shot (He was approximately 20 yards away),
was to the body…no reaction, so the next shot was to the head. He
immediately dropped. Crouching low behind the wall, I moved to the
left side, switching hands as I did so. Pieing from the left, I
could not see the tango. I had to look over the car. I placed 2
shots into the body, then 1 into the head. The tango went down.
I advanced to a car, and looking
forward and to the immediate left, I saw a Tango with and RPG. I
immediately placed 2 shots into him, and then advanced to a drum a
few yards ahead of the car and to the right. Once there, I
sighted-in on a Tango with an RPG and shot 3 times, hitting him
twice. While I was focused on him, the furthest Tango fired a
rocket that looked just like an RPG towards the car. It hit and
smoke started spewing. I immediately focused on the final tango and
fired 3 times, hitting him twice.
I was so focused on the sight
picture all I saw was a puff of smoke. I never saw the rocket. I
thought that the best way to end this was to put rounds down range
and into the threat.
All in all, 13 shots on 5 targets
from 20 yards to 85 yards.
