Awareness Protective Consultants, LLC

Alexander Graham Bell once wrote: "Sometimes we stare so long at a door that is closing that we see too late the one that is open."

Now you can take this quote and look at it many different ways.  Some may look at it as a basic quote that another person wrote and it has no meaning in their life. Another person will look at this quote and say "hey maybe that is so true.. maybe I need to make a change and take a chance".  Still another person will look at that quote very strongly and say that it had major substance and that same person will look at that as a survival quote which will keep them alive in possibly the next encounter they will face. 

My meaning here? Simply this:  Taking that same quote and apply it to a critical incident involving law enforcement tactical situations.  You roll up to a situation that should be a "routine call" (LOL RIGHT)  then suddenly gun shots ring out and your find yourself in the middle of a shoot out.   For a brief moment you see a frozen moment where things move so slow it is as if you are freezing in motion.  Then suddenly, the threat presents themselves to you and you only get that one shot to take that deadly threat down.  What moment do you seize there?  What door is open for you to make that moment a "life saving" moment for you or an innocent person caught in the cross fire?

For the past few years we have sent out articles explaining the importance of training, and training hard.  In the line of work of Law Enforcement, Military and in many areas of security aspects, there are many critical elements that are growing in large numbers.  A recent incident here in our state yielded an arrest of a former U.S. soldier who was caught near a convenience store after a foot pursuit with law enforcement.  During the arrest the suspect was found with some major heavy duty fire power weapons such as a Bushmaster rifle and many other assorted deadly weapons.  This person had some very evil intentions to due some harm to many people however, thanks to the extreme courage and guts of the officers who apprehended this person, we have one less crazed gunman on the streets. 

It is getting scary out here people. Understand that in our line of work, if you take short cuts, if you cut corners in training yourself and your personnel, this will CERTAINLY lead to nothing more than fatal results.  I am seeing more and more of this where agencies are letting advanced tactical skill development training for their personnel take a back seat to other priorities that does not cover officer survival. 

I recently had some students ask me about attending street survival seminars and if I thought they were another valuable training sessions.  I was taken back to think "is it a valuable training session?  With the name STREET SURVIVAL, would you not think it was a valuable training seminar?"  Of course they apologized for asking then picked my brain on other training.  Simply my responses were , "go to any training that involves tactics, survival, firearms training, self defense, use of force and anything else you can think of into your arsenal."   I have always told students and close friends to never just settle for some trainer who got notoriety because they were on television for something many of us teach, preach and live every day.  That person will not be there in the fight you are in and they certainly will not be picking up the phone as your lifeline during that same critical battle you are engaged in.

In summary, take pride in who you are.  The streets have become more unforgiving while at the same time the bad guys are getting stronger and deadlier and play by a different set of rules.  Although we have to play by a certain set of "guidelines and procedures" ask yourself this: when you are in a major critical deadly force type situation, will your policies and procedures be there to help stop the bullets coming at you?  I don't think so.  So.....DON'T STOP TRAINING!