Equipment Considerations
In the past, having a flashlight with you at all times meant lugging around a huge chunk of metal so large it was more often used as a club than a light. Today, a variety of hand held lights are available, sized from tiny LED lights the diameter of a quarter to lithium-powered lights bright enough to melt paint off your car. Size has decreased, brightness increased, and ergonomic designs make it easier to fight with light in one hand, and pistol in the other.

There are even attachments and light designs that allow you to use the light as an impact instrument. Striking an attacker with the light, while certainly not my first choice in a fight, could buy me the time necessary to get my firearm going.

Guidelines for selecting lights are similar to choosing what weapon to carry. Like your pistol, the light should match your hand size and be something you are willing to carry. A crew-served flashlight left by the bed is just as worthless as a gigantic pistol, capable of stopping a freight train, but too big to strap to your side.

Additionally, you'll probably want to equip yourself with multiple lights. Low powered lights are good for administrative duties, which don't require blinding white light, allowing you to conserve the burn time of your combative light for life-threatening situations. No matter what type or brand of combative light you carry, parts break and batteries expire. Fights rarely contain time to go home or back to your vehicle to retrieve a spare flashlight.

Duct Tape Days
Mounting a light onto our weapon, a feat accomplished in the old days with duct tape, hose clamps and plenty of shade-tree engineering, is another option. A light attached to the weapon may be a great idea, depending on anticipated use, but there are some serious drawbacks. Having only the one light attached to my gun makes it difficult to hold a threat while scanning with the light to check for additional bad guys. The other side of that coin is the light can't be pointed toward anyone without covering them with your muzzle. Without additional lights, or only practicing with the weapon-mounted light, sooner or later you'll find yourself in the hurt locker.

Training To Fight
The purpose of the light is the same as it was when man carried torches. Humans are visually oriented creatures, especially during violent encounters, where approximately 90 percent of our input on what is occurring is obtained through eyesight. Lights assist us with exploring unfamiliar surroundings, locating possible threats and determining their capabilities. These assessments provide information necessary to formulate and implement a response. Depending on who we are, this may be avoidance and escape, defensive counters, attack and apprehension, or combinations of all the above.

Regardless of who we are, or what we do, becoming proficient at low light fighting is more complicated than just buying a light, waiting for it to get dark, and shooting small groups onto a target. There is a variety of lighting techniques. Each method has advantages and disadvantages, and most fights will require a combination of techniques. The procedures discussed here are limited to those using a light with a pressure-activated switch on the tail cap.

For example, the Harries technique is a great fighting technique for low light environments. Harries replicates a stable fighting stance, provides support from the secondary hand, and indexes the light and weapon in the same direction. However, with the light on the right side of the pistol, for a right handed shooter, it isn't the best choice when working around a corner to the right or shooting from the left side of cover. Under these conditions it's best to employ a technique with the light on the left side of the pistol. Positioning the light on the correct side limits the amount of ourselves we expose to the threat, and prevents the light from reflecting off the corner or cover. That reflection not only illuminates us, allowing the threat to see us more clearly, but also screws up our night vision. Another downside is the Harries, when done properly, requires a good bit of isometric tension to keep the wrists from separating during recoil. Searching, holding a threat, or fighting for extended periods of time with Harries can quickly become tiring.

The Rogers technique, with the light positioned like a cigar or syringe between the first two fingers of the support hand, provides a two-handed grip similar to that normally used. Yet if you are working around a left corner, or the right side of cover, the light will again be on the wrong side of the weapon. A large light and small hands makes the Rogers a difficult technique to master, and it takes slightly longer to get the light positioned in your fingers, which there may not be time to do.

With the FBI method, the support hand holds the light out to your side away from the body. This works well when it's necessary to index the weapon in one direction while scanning with the light in another. It's also a quick position to assume if you have the light in-hand prior to presenting the pistol. Some of the disadvantages are that it forces you to shoot without any support from the secondary hand, and requires more attention during firing to insure the light is pointed in the same direction as your weapon.
Another single-hand technique is the neck index method. Here the support hand and light are positioned against the neck and jaw with the firing hand and pistol extended forward. This stance is quick to assume and indexes the light in the direction of the weapon, but again has the disadvantage of forcing the shooter to fire with only one hand supporting the gun.

Drawing and Thinking
In addition to various lighting techniques, you must also practice presentation of the light and your weapon. The proper sequence of actions requires that you pull the light in against your chest as you draw, insuring your muzzle doesn't cover or sweep the support hand. Then flow into the chosen lighting technique as you push the weapon forward.

Where will you secure the light when it comes time to free-up the support hand for reloads or malfunction clearances? The answer to this question depends on whether you have some type of lanyard on the light or a carry pouch on your belt. Alternatives are to secure the light under your armpit or stick it into a pocket.

When it comes to applying the light, do you use it a little bit - or a lot? There could be enough ambient light in your environment to leave the flashlight off until locating a possible threat, or the situation may require using the light the entire time. One thing is for sure, as soon as the button is pushed on that million candle-power light, everyone around is going to know where you are. When, and equally important where, should you move? After engaging a threat we may need to move, with the light out, to avoid being targeted by additional threats. Or it may be necessary to hold on the downed threat, insuring it no longer represents a danger. It might not be a bad idea to be moving the entire time.

Approaching a parking garage late at night you notice several lights are out, making it difficult to see. Something just doesn't feel right. Out comes your flashlight. Rounding a corner you see a sudden movement and a man steps out. Focusing on his hands, you see what appears to be a knife. Your light comes on, confirming that, yes, it is a knife. At the same time he begins approaching, telling you not to move. Smoothly drawing your pistol, you pull the light into the neck index position because it is a quick technique to assume, and you move back to create distance.

On seeing your immediate response, and your weapon, the threat quickly ducks back behind the corner. Using the FBI technique, while pointing the pistol in the direction of the corner where the threat disappeared, you scan around looking for additional bad guys. Deciding that a tactical withdraw is the best option you begin working your way out of the garage, clearing right and left side corners, dictating use of both a right and left side lighting technique.

Learning how to employ the various techniques required to solve this example, and flowing from one to another smoothly, is not something you'll want to attempt when your life depends on your performance. As Clint Smith, director of Thunder Ranch, is fond of saying, "It's very hard to acquire new combative skills in the middle of a fight."

Practice

Becoming adept at fighting in low light conditions requires plenty of work, yet a large number of people only practice when they attend a training class. All the schooling in the world won't help you if you fail to practice. The most common excuse for not training under low light conditions is that there are very few outdoor ranges that allow you to shoot at night. Most indoor ranges restrict your ability, either through rules and regulations or the structural environment itself, to move, shoot, use cover, and engage multiple targets. My response is to explain you don't have to visit a shooting range to train in low light. Using a dummy weapon (mine were sawn out of wood) you can practice all the necessary skills in your home, garage or back yard without firing a shot. Then go to the range to confirm and hone your manipulation and marksmanship skills while handling the light.

Get Your Mind Right

Winning a violent encounter requires combining equipment and physical capabilities, and most importantly your mental abilities, into one package. That thing you carry around with you is called a brain, your most important asset. If it's not properly prepared it won't matter how many hours or dollars you expend on gear, gun schools, ammo and practice. The most common, and dangerous, problem I see as an instructor is the range mentality syndrome. Treat every aspect of your preparation and training as though your life depends on it. Instead of spending time at the range shooting cardboard targets, you should mentally instill as much realism as possible into your practice.

Imagine your life, or that of a family member or fellow officer, depends on your performance during each drill. Even when you spend a lot of quality time working on your skills, don't think you still won't make mistakes. When we goof up on the range a lot of us will stop, glance around at our buddies to giggle nervously, or want to start the drill over.

During a fight, mistakes must immediately be acknowledged mentally, compensated or corrected, and your response should continue. When it comes time to fight, keep in mind regardless of your prior training, sometimes, as Bill Jordan says in his book No Second Place Winner, "The right action is sensed against all logic, and the wise man follows his hunch and lives."

Final Thoughts
There is a certain Zen-like quality to violence. At any time, in any location, and without warning it can strike. Anyone you come into contact with, or everyone for that matter, is capable of being a lethal threat. Two seconds from now bad guys are going to come through the closest door with pistols in hand. Think it can't happen? It recently happened to my brother.

Two men, intent on robbery, entered his place of business with pistols drawn, and killed him. However, after taking several hits, two of them "fatal," my brother continued to fight, driving the attackers out into the parking lot. The body can absorb an enormous amount of punishment if the mind is up to the task.

If you haven't been involved in a violent encounter yet, all this means is your chances of being in a violent attack have increased exponentially. If you have already had a violent experience, then you understand the need for preparation. Your attitude toward training should be as if you or your family will be attacked by bad people with homicidal intent this evening - or sooner. Harsh words and thoughts, but as Helen Keller reminds us in The Open Door: "Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it."

Dedicated to Mark McKee, 1962-2004, a true warrior.

Tiger McKee is director of Shootrite Firearms Academy, located in Huntsville, Ala.
www.shootrite.org
e-mail: tiger@shootrite.org
(256) 721-4602.