Those in the shooting and self defense communities have watched the increase in mass shootings, and terrorist incidents with alarm. Unfortunately there is very little information on the details of these types of engagements, specifically pertaining to long gun usage. This article will break down the key stats for various types of rifle engagements so that you can see how to defend yourself and your loved ones more effectively.
This article is a continuation from a previous article where I examined self defense shootings with pistols. In that article I broke down the key differences between successful and unsuccessful shootings, and I can tell you that those key predictors aren’t what you think they are. Hint, Hint, having a fast draw did not matter!
This article is very similar. I combed the internet looking for videos of rifle shooting engagements, and I analyzed them for key predictors of success and failure. Let me tell you there were a few surprising stats.
As a quick overview these videos were taken from a variety of locations. Many of them were your run of the mill criminals armed with rifles and several of them were active shooter incidents and terrorist attacks from over seas.
I also examined shootings where police and security forces were engaging with rifles as well. I did not use any combat footage as that isn’t particularly relevant to us in a self defense scenario.
Now, without further ado, the stats!
Rifle Shooting Locations
My analysis shows 73% of these engagements were outdoors, with the most common location being on a roadway or street. Of the 23% of indoor engagements the most common location was a mall or store.
This makes sense as rifles are designed to increase the distances that you can safely engage. They can be unwieldy indoors and at close distances. My research has shown that the average engagement distance was 60ft.
I should point out that there were a few outliers, such as the Las Vegas shooter, who engaged at over 1000ft. Disregarding this incident, most engagements are right around the 20 yard range, which is getting towards the effective end of where a pistol can be used by the majority of skilled shooters.
Now that we know where and how far these engagements happen let’s look at some of the stats for criminals and terrorists who use rifles.
Assailant Statistics
Many of these engagements were terrorist incidents, and others were active shooters, with the balance being police video’s and “normal” criminal violence perpetrated with rifles.
Many of the incidents had multiple perpetrators, all armed with rifles. Statistically there was an average of 1.33 assailants per incident. This is one of the key figures that I discovered during my analysis.
If you’re reading this article then you no doubt have considered what a self defense scenario might look like, but I bet you probably haven’t considered defending against 2 or more attackers armed with long guns!
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Shooting, Moving and Direction of Attack
The vast majority of these attackers made no attempt to hide where they were shooting from, and they often used cover ineffectively. Take a look at this video to see what I’m talking about.
Only 13% of attackers made any attempt to hide their weapons during the attack, and only 60% of them even bothered aiming. The vast majority of rifle shooters were simply point firing.
These attackers were fairly accurate especially considering that they were shooting and moving in 60% of the scenarios. This movement is one of the key reason that the average engagement time was 55 sec which is much longer than most pistol engagements are. The distance and increased accuracy allows the shooter to move around and still successfully engage their target.
The vast majority of these attacks were frontal attacks (47%) with the next most common being a flank or rear attack. Attacks from the rear were 20%, and attacks from the 3 or 9 o’clock position were also 20%. The remaining 13% of attacks were from 11-2 o’clock positions.
Rifle Engagement: Cover and Concealment
Use of cover and concealment is a key predictor of success in any gunfight, and this proved to be true for rifles as well. The majority of shooters (67%) did use cover or concealment during firing.
Of these video’s, 47% were police engagements either with police shooting, or criminals, but when trained shooters were analyzed it was clear they sought cover much more often and much more quickly in the gunfight.
Trained shooters often engaged at further distances as well. Only 13% of engagements were close enough for any grappling to take place. Check this video out to see what I mean.
Success and Failure of Rifle Attacks
The majority of these were bad guy initiated ambushes. As you might imagine being caught in an ambush isn’t good and it doesn’t lead to favorable situation for the ambushed.
Overall the attackers won 60% of the time, and the good guys lost 40% of the time. I counted any fatality or wounding as a win for the bad guys. In these scenarios there were 13% that resulted in minor or survivable wounds to the good guy.
Lessons Learned from Rifle Attacks
The vast majority of the bad guy attacks were great examples of what not to do in a gunfight. They were most often seen walking down the middle of an open area making no attempt to find cover, and rarely aiming their weapons.
From watching these video’s it seemed like people treated rifles like they were magical talismans that prevented them from getting hurt. I’m not sure if this is a legacy of video games and movies, but it does seem to bode well for the good guys.
I would also point out that in the vast majority of terrorist or active shooter attacks the attackers would quite often shoot people lying wounded on the ground. I would not recommend playing possum, and even if you are injured you need to do everything you can to get out of the attacker’s line of sight.
The majority of mistakes the bad guys made were violations of basic shooting, and gunfighting principles. Suffice it to say if you take a good course from a reputable instructor, and actually practice your skills, you will be light years ahead of most of these morons.
If you want to learn even more about active shooter events, then check out this article. Now get out there and start training!
I’d like to extended a special thanks to the Youtube Channel Active Self Protection. They provided many of these video’s and they are a great resource for all things self defense.
