To be truly prepared, our training should address the most likely scenarios we will face.
Its essential to get familiar with some techniques for working it in concert with your handgun.
Ultimately, I have distilled that down to three or four that might work under extreme stress.
Many potentially lethal engagements may occur at night. Are you adequately prepared to recognize and respond to such a threat?
A small flashlight holds any number of advantages.
However, the most important is that it helps you to sort out the good guys from the bad.
Night sights were considered exotic and were rarely encountered.
Weapon-mounted lights are highly capable, but for discreet carry, you could consider a handheld unit.
Small flashlights existed, but the light output was insufficient for defensive applications.
That all changed in the 1980s when an upstart company called Laser Products introduced the Surefire 6P flashlight.
For those applications, the pistol size with an attached illuminator isnt much of an issue.
Small, high-intensity tactical flashlights are especially well suited for hands-apart shooting techniques.
For discreet carry on smaller pistols used for personal defense, that extra bulk may be problematic.
Are We Doing It All Wrong?
Techniques for coordinating a handheld flashlight with a pistol fall into one of two categories.
In close quarters, you may be able to deflect or even block an incoming strike with the support arm using ahands-apart technique.
The first I would describe as hands apart where the handgun and light work independently of one another.
This affords the user the ability to direct the gun and light to different locations.
The second category includes the hands together techniques where the gun and light are locked together.
Hands-together flashlight-assisted shooting techniques are great for threats in the distance, but may come up short in close quarters.
This may give the user improved stability to shoot accurately at farther distances.
On the downside, where the light goes, the gun follows, possibly creating an unsafe situation.
To get an even better handle on this, lets consider reality.
The hands-apart technique shown here allows the user to direct the light in a different place than the muzzle of the gun.
Do you really think you will have the time to set up that fancy hands-together technique?
An example might include a suspicious person that you havent necessarily determined to be a threat to your safety.
This is not possible with a hands-together technique.
My preferred close-quarters techniques include the Modified FBI and Neck Index.
It can be easily adapted to the use of cover.
My personal favorite is the Neck Index.
The light is held in the support hand the exact same way as the FBI technique.
But rather than holding the light at arms length, it is indexed on the jawline.
The technique is dirt simple, intuitive and well-suited to close-range encounters.
With the above techniques, one must be somewhat proficient in one-handed shooting.
Considering that many situations unravel at a conversational distance, this shouldnt be too steep a hill to climb.
Conclusion
Give this all some serious consideration.
A little one-hand shooting practice can only help your cause.
Get yourself a quality light and keep it readily accessible.
At the first sign of danger, that light should be in your hand.
When confronted with deadly danger at spitting distance, simple is always better than complicated.
