Episode 8: Practical Defense ft. Bryan McKenrick (Part 4)

Bryan McKenrick, the leader and owner of American Tactical Defense, LLC., an Active Shooter Training Company, has spent a career in law enforcement doing drug interdiction operations with the Coast Guard and other law enforcement agencies. Bryan now trains law enforcement personnel on active shooter events and joins the MAG-TAC Podcast for Four (4) episodes. In this episode, Bryan talks about improvised weapons and the reality of facing someone with a gun. There is a difference throwing a stapler at someone and introducing serious pain with a Maglite flashlight.

MAGLITE: 00:07 Welcome to the next episode here of MAG-TAC podcast (by Maglite Tactical). We're going to be joined by Bryan (McKenrick) from American Tactical (Defense) again. Maglite (Maglite Tactical) wants to keep you safe, they want to help keep your family safe. That's what this series is all about. This is why we're putting this information out there and we want you to know that we care enough to do this and put this together and it's important to us. And there's a whole line of Maglite Tactical products that you can check out as well. Joining us here, Bryan (McKenrick) from American Tactical (Defense), Bryan, we're going to be talking about improvised weapons and I thought it was interesting when you sent me the subject matter that you wanted to talk about. It was misconceptions of how to use improvised weapons and I wasn't sure what you meant by that and I'm fascinated to find out. So let's get right to it.

BRYAN MCKENRICK: 00:54 Absolutely. So I appreciate you bringing that up. You know that there's a lot of folks out there training a lot of different sites, schools, and whatnot. Folks, I'm going to put it to you like this for all of you. If you think that throwing an object at a person with a gun is going to stop that person from continuing to shoot, good luck. Because me in law enforcement, I will never go against those odds. What we do like to bring up is the fact that there's fire extinguishers in every class and I've seen it out there to where folks are actually getting the fire extinguisher and being trained to spray somebody with a gun and they're standing right in front of him. Now, common sense tells me if that person keeps pulling the trigger, that cloud of fire extinguisher powder is not going to stop the bullet from entering your body. So, even down to staplers and chairs and cue balls to any object, I was a pitcher for the Brewers farm team, when I was in high school, and today if I picked up a baseball and I were to try to throw it at a shooter and stop him from shooting, I'm gonna miss or I'm just gonna piss him off. Excuse my language. Now, with that being said, you have to think about what is going to be an effective measure, improvised weapons? Anything that is long and controlled or heavy and hard, such as a Maglite flashlight, you can block. You can temporarily blind them. But the biggest part is you want to set yourself up to where the person's distracted. And you want to be able to smash that person in the face, cause him pain. Guess what? These little, these folks are cowards. They're coming in, they're coming in with not understanding that they're the dominant factor. They have the gun, but as soon as they're introduced with pain, they're going to stop. They're not expecting pain. And if you use an improvised weapon in control with an effective measure, it's gonna destroy his plan and now you have an opportunity rather than trying pick up a chair. I mean, can you imagine some teachers trying to pick up an actual desk chair and trying to harm that person for good, either potentially knock them out or stop them all together? It's just doesn't fit the bill. And I want to clarify some of that.

MAGLITE: 03:16 Well, I've been through a training or two with you previously and one of the things that you teach people to do is introduce pain preferably into their face, which will tend to get people focused on the pain in their face. And that gives you the opportunity to then get over the top of that firearm and pull it downwards away from them. Correct?

BRYAN MCKENRICK: 03:39 Right. W that, that biggest thing is exactly that. I want to ask you this, you ever been hit or punched or nicked in the nose by accident? I mean,

MAGLITE: 03:50 Well, yeah, yeah. I got sucker punched coming out of a bar one time when I was in my twenties. I went right to the ground.

BRYAN MCKENRICK: 03:57 There you go. Now if you're not even into that scene and you're accidentally hit, or somebody accidentally touched your nose on accident, I mean it lights your world up and you stop doing what you were doing because now your eyes are watering. This sensation of pain just stopped everything. And that's your opportunity to do exactly what you mentioned. You want to get that gun down and out of that individual's hands because that is allowing him to be the dominant factor and he's the one pulling the trigger, making that gun go. So you gotta get it from him.

MAGLITE: 04:26 So again, to go back to the very beginning, treat the situation. Don't assume it's firecrackers. Get away from it. Run... If you can't run anymore, Hide. And the difference between Concealment and Cover is important to understand. And we covered that in an earlier episode. You can go back and listen to that. It's about two episodes ago. And then barricading pros and cons. Do you barricade? Do you not barricade? It depends on what kind of group you're with, who you have with you, exactly what the situation is. And here we are finally to fight, which is improvised weapons are not throwing a stapler at somebody's head's not going to stop somebody with an AK-47, but you can, if you're able to introduce significant pain, get enough of a distraction to give you a chance. Right Bryan?

BRYAN MCKENRICK: 05:18 Absolutely. I trust something in my hands, like a, an object that is small enough. And to be able to target the face area, very accurately, much more than trying to throw something and hope for the best that it knocks him out because otherwise it's not a good day.

MAGLITE: 05:37 Bryan (McKenrick), American Tactical Defense...We've done four episodes over the last few weeks. I'm so glad to have you join us here and I really appreciate it and we'll have you back some more, Okay.

BRYAN MCKENRICK: 05:47 Thank you. Appreciate it Lou.

MAGLITE: 05:49 Bet you Bryan from American Tactical Defense. Thank you for listening everybody. We'll be back with another episode soon...from the MAG-TAC podcast (by Maglite Tactical).