Granny ~ gimme some of that...

First a caveat: Nothing I write here at this blog, at any post at any time, is advice from me to you whereby I am telling you to do something in any given situation.  I'm merely telling you about some tactics and ideas that some law enforcement agencies use or used in dealing with combative people.  You can choose to do anything you'd like with the ideas.  If you try them in any situation, you may be hurt and if you're hurt, it's not my responsibility.  Not all tactics work in every situation. If you use any of the ideas here and hurt someone else who takes you to court, then it's not my fault.  I'm not telling you to do anything.  I'm not even suggesting.

I'm just sayin'...

Anyone and everyone is invited to offer their suggestions and to post them here.  None will be edited except those that are obviously silly.

The will to win. Never forget this: if you don't fight an attacker who appears determined to hurt you, then he'll probably kill you.  If you do fight and get hurt and stop to feel your pain a/o tend your wounds, he will probably kill you.  If you want to live you have to fight ~ you can't dance, you can't dazzle anyone with your fancy footwork.  If you want to live, you may have to kill your attacker. 

Edged weapons. Rule One in any knife fight: you're going to get cut. So, if your intention in a take-over is to resist, then it may be a good idea to go to a police supply store and get some Kevlar-lined gloves.  Um, before you get to the airport, eh?  They don't sell 'em on the concourse.  Keep them in your carry-on luggage, or better yet, in your coat pockets if you're wearing one.  Most cop stores won't sell them to you unless you're badged so you might have to order them on the Internet.  These gloves may protect your hands, depending on the weapon being used against you and how it's being used. 

You can go to any number of self-defense classes and have some guy show you how to take a knife off someone.  It sure looks easy, eh?  If you practice as much as that instructor does, it's a cinch.  But you're not going to practice and you know it.  So you need to know some basic principles and a couple moves and, if it happens, you may decide to give it your best shot and maybe have a better chance than if you learned some fancy drill ~ and then never practiced it. Those martial arts instructors are good, tough guys and can teach you a lot.  But it's going to take time and effort and money and you may have little or none of any or all. 

Many police officers have the good fortune to attend the Street Survival Seminar, given around the country to police officers, federal agents, correctional officers, and some few others.  Self-defense experts on the SSS staff did a lot of research years back, to determine which edged-weapon disarming technique was best.  Best means effective, easy to remember and employ without hours and hours of practice.

Here goes.  Bad guy with knife.  With both of your hands, grab the wrist of the bad guy on the arm/hand holding the weapon.  Hold on tight no matter what.  Don't let go.  Are you gonna get scratched?  Probably.  See The will to win above.  Anywaaay, while holding on tight; kick, stomp, bang, bite, head-butt, pile-drive, whatever you have to do for as long as you have to in order to control the knife-hand of the attacker.  Presuming that you're not alone, call out to other passengers to help.  More on that below.  You'll possibly have to knock the attacker out.  Well, okay then; he's probably got it comin'.

If you're alone, if you decide to resist a take-over, then you may have to do all this yourself and you can't give up until the bad guy drops the weapon or is knocked out.  If he drops the knife you will probably still have to keep fighting to get him restrained with belts, shoe laces, un so weiter.  If you manage to punch this guy's lights out, good for you.  Then immediately restrain him with whatever you can find. 

Belts.  Shoe laces.  Bag shoulder straps.  Ladies nylons.  Neck-ties.  Yarn?

Take-downs: If terrorists try to take over the plane you're on and you (and others?) decide to resist, you can't go down the aisle pretending you're the heavyweight champeen of the woild.  You can't try to conjure up all that cool stuff you heard and saw on Kung Fu and in Bruce Lee (Beeeee the watah...) movies and put a whippin' on the bad-guys.   Not enough room in the plane for all that movement.  No, the can of whoop-ass you need to open up is labeled: Get the bad guy on the floor as quickly as possible using the minmum amount of force necessary.

It's totally your choice but you might grab a handful of hair.  The best place to grab is on the back of the head.  Why?  Because it's harder for him to reach back there and break your hold than it is if you grab a hunk from the front.  When you've got a good grip, use your strength and weight to drive the terrorist to the floor.  Where the head goes, the body follows. So, assuming this is a worst case scenario, you need to put the hurt on the bad-guy real bad and real quick.   Ergo, maybe he needs to have his head banged into and off of as many solid objects between where his head is when you grab his hair and when you have him on the floor.  So, be creative.  You need to inflict severe pain on him in order to break his train of thought, to disorient, to force him to stop and address his pain.  And, legally, you need to do this using the minimum amount of force necessary to stop his attack.

Remember this, troops; a female terrorist may hurt you first and worst, compared to her male co-workers.  She may feel a need to prove her toughness and commitment to everyone, even you, Mr. Niceguy.  So the little lady with the soft brown eyes may just cut your throat for less than no reason.  Pay attention.

Live.   

Improvised weapons: You may choose to use anything that will induce pain and inflict injury. It doesn't have to be a samurai sword you managed to sneak aboard. Buh-lazin', freakin' HOT coffee in the face is a good one ~ of course this all assumes a worst case scenario where you're trying to prevent take-over of the plane and probable murder of everyone on board and untold numbers on the ground.  Um... aziwuzsayin: coffee, tea, laptop computers, shoes, hangers, belt buckles swung on the end of, guess what?  Belts.   Coffee pots from the galley, that die-cast tractor you were bringing to your nephew.

Probably unsuitable for your purposes in the scenario we're envisioning here: comfy pillows and blankets, club soda, milk, melted ice, toilet paper, Q-tips, pie, German potato salad, fuzzy toys, cellophane wrap, pocket lint, those liiiittle tiny cloths they give you to clean your new glasses when you've spent 400 freakin' dollars on 'em.  I mean, at that price, they should give us something the size of a schooner sail.  Am I bitter?  No; I'm just sayin'...

On 9/11/01 there were 4 to 5 savages per plane.  Savages?  Yep.  Evidence indicates there may be a dozen or more the next time an attempt is made at hi-jacking a plane.  So, it's gonna be the wild-wild west up there and, check it out... you've got no cavalry coming through the door at 30-thousand feet.  So, you're going to have to want to live more than they want to die. 

Am I telling you what to do?  Nope... just offering some ideas based on what has worked in other places and times.  It's your choice.

Be prepared, unerschrocken.

Extremely cool: Spike TV has an absolutely great training video on exactly this subject.  Watch it all here.

Great stuff.  Be sure to check it out.

I knew they'd catch up with me eventually. 

Comments

[JeffG]

Some good ideas here. To the list of improvised weapons let me add one of my favorites: car keys, spare change and anything else you have that is solid and carries some weight, all stuffed into a sock and swung like a bolo. If you've ever been struck in the face with one of these loaded socks, you know exactly how much it hurts. And if you're using a strong cotton sock (as opposed to weak nylon) you have a weapon you can use repeatedly in a short period of time and in an enclosed space.

[dumbledoresarmy]

I have a friend who is five foot nothing, female, Italo-Australian...and spitfire. A tall skinny guy with a knife tried holding her up, view rape, in the small hours as she was walking home from a train station. She didn't scream or faint or freeze; she morphed on the spot into a snarling, hissing wildcat. She kicked off the highheeled shoes so as to be firmer on her feet. She roared, in rage not fright, ferocious Italian curses at him. And she grabbed that knife hand. Grabbed the knife, as it happened; cut her palm badly. But she wrested that knife off him, because I think he was so surprised that the sweet little lady he'd seen tittuping along the path, had gone so vicious so fast. Then with her other hand she got one of her shoes and chased him - he turned tail! - whacking him with it, and still screaming rich ripe Italian curses. That was when the cavalry - three guys from a nearby apartment who'd heard her screeches of rage and come to investigate - arrived, and the bad guy bolted altogether. The good guys administered first aid and escorted my friend to the all-night clinic to have the hand fixed. She wasn't that concerned - what's a cut hand, compared to escaping rape and quite probably murder?

Moral of the story is that the bad guy/s might just possibly be taken by surprise for a few seconds if the intended victim/s, instead of behaving like the meek little pussycats that we ordinary citizens of the West are expected to be, morph into hissing snarling balls of teeth and claws.