Taking the Family to the Range

Rob Pincus encourages you to take your family to the range, whether they are shooters or not. And it’s not just about turning them into shooters, though that would be a great benefit.

The Status Quo

Some of you have already taken your family to the range and perhaps have family members who are shooters. But others may be familiar with the scenario of going to the range alone or with friends, doing some defensive shooting practice or taking a firearms training course, then going home and telling your wife you had a great day, end of story. Your spouse and other family members don’t know much or anything about firearms. The main purpose of taking the family to the range is familiarization.

FAMFIRE

Bringing your family to the range is about educating them and acclimating them to exactly what happens when a gun is fired. The result is that, if a worst-case scenario happens inside your home, your family members won’t freak out just being in the presence of a gun.

Rob knows a lot of families who, out of all the people who live in the house, only one or two are comfortable with firearms. If this describes you, set up a safety trip to the range, a firearms familiarization trip, a basic range class, or just some casual shooting on, for example, national forest land, so people can get used to guns.

High-Stress Situation

If your home is broken into during the night, in the stress and confusion of the incident, you don’t want family members to become distracted and agitated when you access your defensive firearm. This could disrupt your home-defense plans, and family members may not be able to follow your simple orders that will keep them safe.

Making your family comfortable around firearms will help keep them safe during a critical incident.

3 Responses to “Taking the Family to the Range”

1. Will Atkinson December 14th, 2018

   Rob, follow up question, if you get these, how do you suggest preparing a spouse and small children for the aftermath (noise, gunfire, possible wounded attackers, etc.) of a break in where one might have to use a weapon? I have a plan for where I would like my wife to grab the small children and take them to a relatively safe place in our home in that event. (We don’t have a safe room, but I have places where I feel they would be safest in the event of an exchange of gunfire due to a front entry of our home). I would like them to go to a closet in the back of the home where I would expect (no guarantees) they would be most likely to avoid stray fire.
   Thanks again, good advice about preparation, just thinking it through.
   Will

   Reply

   • Customer Service December 26th, 2018

     Hello Will,

     This is just a matter of developing the plan and practicing putting it into place. This includes instructions such as do not leave the barricade position until the police arrive, giving them permission to flee the house without you if possible, do not approach or provide aid to an attacker, etc. If you are worried about noise damage to ears maybe stage some type of hearing protection at the barricade position. If staging electronic hearing protection you should remember to periodically test the batteries and replace them at regular intervals. Use the following link to get more information on Home Defense and tactics: https://www.personaldefensenetwork.com/vtag/home-defense/

     Hope this helps,

     Deryck
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2. Will Atkinson December 14th, 2018

   Thank you Rob, this is great input. It’s not only about personal readiness, it’s about for the entire family and their ability to understand what I (or they) might have to do. Great stuff, keep it up!

   Reply