Force on Force Safety Protocol
Force on Force training is only as safe as the people running the training. Guy Minnis, the Director of Training for HARD TARGET Firearms Training, is a retired police officer and he use to be the Firearms Training Coordinator with the Evansville Police Department (EPD). Guy has been involved in countless Force on Force training scenarios with EPD officers and Guy is a certified Simunition Instructor. HARD TARGET uses the Simunition FX Training System and Guy follows their recommended safety protocol to keep everybody safe during Force on Force training scenarios.Here is what you, the student, must know before attending Force on Force training:
- You must wear long pants, a long sleeve shirt, and it is recommended that you wear a pair of thin leather gloves, like batting gloves or racquetball gloves.
- All skin must be covered.
- Men and women must wear an athletic cup. We check for the cup by having you use your knuckle to knock on the cup.
- When you report to the training area for Force on Force training, you will not be allowed to have anything on your person. No keys, wallet, cell phones, change, or anything else. Obviously, no weapons will be allowed on your person. If you come to the training location and you are armed, you will be required to lock your weapon (including knives or any other kind of weapons) in the trunk of your car.
- Once everyone has removed everything from their pockets and belt line, you will be searched to make sure that you have nothing on your person that could injure yourself or anyone else.
- Once you have been searched, you will not be allowed to be out of the sight of our instructors. You will either be the “target” student for a scenario, you may play a very minor role in a scenario, or you will be watching the scenario.
- If you leave to use the restroom, you will be searched again before entering the training area. There are no scheduled breaks in the training since the training only last about 3 to 3 ½ hours.
- You will be issued a helmet and throat protector. You must have these two safety equipment items on at all times (including the athletic cup) while the scenario is in progress.
- Women will be given the front panel of body armor and they must wear this body armor panel while the scenarios are in progress. This protects the breasts from being bruised.
- No one will remove any of the safety equipment until the “all clear” has been given by Guy Minnis.
- All training weapons will be collected and made safe before the “all clear” is given.
These safety rules will be covered prior to the training, but it works better if you read and understand these rules before you arrive at the training location. These rules are put into place so that no one will be injured by a live fire weapon that could be accidentally introduced into the training scenario. Only HARD TARGET’s training weapons will be allowed in the training area and only those weapons will be used for training.
Will it leave a mark? Yes, the marking cartridges will leave a red welt that may turn into a bruise. If they hit exposed skin, they are capable of breaking the skin and leaving a red welt.
How close can I get when firing at a role player? Our role players are very well trained to not allow you to get too close. But, to answer your question we do not allow “contact shots” and we try to maintain a distance of at least 12 inches between the muzzle and the intended target. We also do not allow any hand to hand combat during these scenarios.
Do you have a way of stopping the scenario should something dangerous develop? Yes, the instructor running the scenario will shout out, “CEASE FIRE! STOP THE SCENARIO!” At this time the “target” student should stop immediately, point the training weapon in a safe direction, and wait for further instructions.
Should I pad up with clothing so the marking rounds will not hurt so much? No, we want you to feel the pain and be afraid of the pain. This is what helps to make the training real. Instructors will not shoot you over and over just for the hell of it. If they shoot you, you will most likely only be shot a very few times, but if you handle everything the way you should, there is an excellent chance that you will not be shot at all.
When I get hit with a marking round, should I stop immediately and play dead? NEVER! Let me say that again – NEVER!!! We want to train you to survive and to win the deadly force encounter. We will never tell you that you are DEAD and you should not stop fighting until you hear the instructor in charge call out “THE SCENARIO IS OVER!” This signals the end of the scenario and then and only then will you stop no matter how many times you get shot. We want to train you to fight through the pain and never give up. There is an old saying that goes something like this, “If you get into a fist fight, you should expect to get punched. If you get into a knife fight, you should expect to get cut. If you get into a gunfight, you should expect to get shot.” So the moral of this story is, expect to get shot, but do everything in your power to not get shot. But if you do get shot, do not stop fighting! Keep fighting until you take the bad guys out of the equation.
Guy, you have played the role of the bad guy in hundreds of Force on Force scenarios. Surely to goodness you pad up, right? Wrong! Ask anyone that has been involved in Force on Force with me while I was playing the role of a bad guy and they will all tell you that I never pad up. I experience what the student experiences and I do not like getting shot with FX ammo, but I have been shot more times than I can count and I still come back for more. Maybe that just says I am crazy, but I do not think so. When I get shot, you get an honest reaction out of me. Most of the time I will flinch, jump, scream, holler, run like hell (well as fast as an old man can run), and flop on the ground. But, there are times that you will shoot me and you will see no reaction and I keep coming after you. This really scares the hell out of the students, but I do this because no two people react exactly the same way when they are shot. I am not talking about when they are shot with FX marking rounds either; I am talking about when they are shot with the real stuff. You have to be prepared to shoot the bad guy multiple times to stop him, so do not be surprised if one, two, three, or four rounds do not get the job done. When that happens, make yourself you slow down, see the front sight, press the trigger, and shoot the bad guy in the eye. When you put a round in the old snot locker the fight should be over. My philosophy is that all gunfights should end with a shot to the head. If by the time you are ready to go to the head and he is no longer there, then you do not use the head shot, but if he is still there and is still a threat – END THE FIGHT!
We will provide real world scenarios, state of the art safety equipment, training guns, and FX ammunition. We will also provide certified Simunition instructors that will make your experience as real as it gets. At the end of a training scenario it is not uncommon for us to see – hands shaking, a deer in the headlights look, rapid breathing, rapid heart rate, rapid – rambling speech, sweating profusely, and our students have confirmed that they suffered tunnel vision and auditory exclusion. No one has peed their pants yet, but we are still working on it. In all seriousness, we want this training experience to be a once in a lifetime kind of experience. We want it to be so real, that you truly believe that it is really happening to you. That is when we know we have done our jobs as deadly force instructors.
Be sure to read about “stress inoculation.” This is a term used by Lt. Col. Dave Grossman, U.S. Army retired. You will find this information when you go to the main menu and go to the “Company” drop down menu. Click on the tab, “Tactical & Safety Info” and then find the Mind Set Part 2 commentary. I talk briefly about “stress inoculation” near the end of that article under the information about Lt. Col. Dave Grossman.
