SEAL Survival Guide (17 page)

MOVING AS A GROUP

If you find yourself among a group of other survivors, it’s now your job to assign responsibilities. This will focus individuals who are likely still in a serious panic mode. Maintain group cohesion by displaying a sense of purpose and by offering a reasonable game plan. Remind people: “We’re in this together, and we’re going to get out of this together.”

Your group has now become a small unit and can benefit from using standard, small-unit tactics and techniques employed by the
military. Usually, but again depending upon the scenario, it’s better to move in single file, where each person has a couple of feet or an arm’s length of separation. Assign a person on the line to scout out areas that you plan to travel to during your evacuation. By using all eyes, the group maintains
360 degrees of awareness.
The leader, or the one in point position, is responsible for the front 180 degrees—or from nine o’clock to three o’clock, with twelve o’clock always being the direction of travel. The second person covers the left, the third covers the right, and so on. The last person in line scopes out the rear to alert the group of any indication that the shooter is following them. If you are in the rear, don’t walk backward; you will undoubtedly trip and fall. Instead, every three or four steps stop momentarily and spin back. Then continue moving forward. The last person will be responsible for the 180 degrees of the rear view (from three o’clock to nine o’clock). This method allows you to know what could be coming at you and gives you the extra seconds needed to react.

Step 5: Live or Die

Sometimes, the only way out is to fight. There will be times when your course of action might be limited to taking on the shooter. As cold-blooded and mechanical as these shooters seem, especially with firepower in their hands, they are expecting to eventually come against some intervention or police confrontation. This oftentimes will lead to overconfidence or recklessness and brazen actions. The 1997 shoot-out at a North Hollywood bank is an excellent example. Two heavily armed men robbed a bank, and when they confronted police upon exiting the bank, they expended two thousand rounds of ammunition before they were finally gunned down, despite believing they were invincible. It’s best to try to capitalize on a shooter’s lack of discipline or training when trying to plan an attack.

HOW TO SET AN AMBUSH

The best ambush is one in which your target ends up in the exact location you want them in, essentially walking right into your trap. Put yourself in a hidden position that the shooter must pass by. This is known as the “strike zone.” Obviously, surprise is the key to a successful ambush. Additionally, you will increase the odds of your success with a weapon. (See “Improvised Weapons,”
page 301
.)

Types of ambushes

• 
Ambush with multiple people:
This is the ideal form of ambush. You have greater numbers and are able to strike from multiple positions simultaneously. Just remember that with multiple people, the odds of hurting one of your own increase. Make sure that you direct those in your party to remain at preestablished set points in the ambush to avoid causalities from what is referred to as “friendly fire.”

• 
L ambush:
One group sets up to lure the shooter toward them, while the other group, to the right or left, is prepared to engage once the shooter enters the strike zone.

I can’t emphasize enough the necessity of violence of action for an ambush to be effective. If you must face the shooter and it comes down to either his going down or your dying, this is “pull the trigger” time, and you can and will put every ounce of your being into defeating the enemy. Survival is your
mission
! (See “Fighting,”
page 146
, for more on how to approach an attack.)

ACTIVE SHOOTER NEUTRALIZED

If the ambush is successful and the shooter is dead, good; the mad dog is done. If the shooter is alive, then make sure to bind and gag them.

Never assume this is the only shooter or that the incident is now over!

1. Stop and listen; do you hear any more gunfire?

2. Does the shooter you took down have a radio? If they do, there is someone else they must have been communicating with.

3. Attempt to get further information regarding the number and location of other shooters from the assailant using any effective form of coercion. Yes, I mean torture. This person was trying to kill you and other innocents; I would use whatever means necessary to know whether he or she is acting alone.

4. Immediately inform the police of your status and pass on any useful information.

Again, never assume an active-shooter situation is over until law enforcement declares it to be over. Strip any and all equipment the
shooter may have for your own use. Take weapons, ammo, and body armor. Any communication equipment will be especially useful. It will not only enable you to monitor what the other shooters are doing, but it will give you the opportunity to jam their communication with each other.

ALLOCATION OF RESOURCES

Divvy up the weapons and equipment you have taken from the shooter and give them to those most experienced and capable of using them. If there is only one weapon or set of body armor, give it to the point man, because he or she is up front and the one most likely to encounter the next shooter.

Step 6: Encountering Law Enforcement

If you’re successful and you make it out alive, you surely don’t want police to think you are one of the assailants; you don’t want to die from this form of
friendly fire.
As in the military, law enforcement officers are taught to look at people’s hands first. If your hands are free of weapons, then you aren’t considered a shooting threat. So when you are about to exit and think there is a high probability of encountering law enforcement, you must empty your hands. Put all weapons on the ground and away from you. Place hands high in the air and yell out, “Friendlies—we are unarmed.” Keep repeating this, and do so loudly. Do exactly as you are instructed to do at this point; there will be time for them to realize that you are the survivors once police have you in a nonthreatening posture.