Category Archive 'Tex Grebner'

10 Jul 2011

It Wasn’t a Glock

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Thanks to commenter T.C. Carney (I have the best commenters!), we now know that Derek “Tex’ Grebner shot himself in the leg in the video I posted on July 7th, not with a pistol featuring a Glock-style trigger safety.

He was using a Kimber Pro Carry II, a premium adaptation, incorporating some of the features commonly found in customized upgrades, of the classic Colt Model 1911 chambered in .45 ACP.

Mr. Grebner experienced a “negligent discharge” (personally, I think there is a very strong association between these kind of f**kups and the mentality which emphasizes and places overreliance on pretentious jargon) while attempting to draw and fire his Kimber from “defensive retention” out of a 5.11 ThumbDrive Holster.

It was one of those “tactical,” black, kydex, ultra-macho-military klunky holsters that grips the gun, and has a button catch you have to push to release it.

The unfortunate Mr. Grebner was clearly a bit distracted, and was trying to perform a fast draw involving pushing on a holster retention button as well. It just might be that the 5.11 ThumbDrive Holster is not the optimal choice for many conventional automatic pistols, because that retention button happens to be located on the left side of the pistol right next to the safety on the Model 1911 (and many other pistols). So the hurrying Mr. Grebner apparently failed to release his Kimber from the holster, instead he clicked off the pistol’s side safety when he fumbled for the holster button.

The gun failed to release, and Mr. Grebner tells us that, as he pushed that button again, his finger “curled into the trigger guard, and [he] ripped a bullet into [his] leg.”

Ouch!

It must have hurt like hell, and Mr. Grebner was actually very lucky that the bullet penetrated at such an angle that it missed his femur and major blood vessels and then exited without causing a lot graver injury.

Accidents happen, of course. Mr. Grebner’s experience provides a warning to us all that guns are dangerous and we need to be alert and scrupulously careful in shooting at all times.

I personally do not like synthetic materials like kydex. I think kydex knife sheaths and holsters are both tacky and clunky, and I wouldn’t ever own one.

Tex Grebner explicitly declined to blame the holster, but obviously if you are going to try to draw fast, I’d say choosing a holster with a button release you have to push to get the gun out is a suboptimal choice. A retention button placed where it has some probability of being confused with the gun’s safety is also not a desirable feature.

The holster, of course, didn’t shoot Tex Grebner in the leg. He did it himself. Whatever problem one has getting the gun out of the holster, you still have to pay attention and be conscious of where your trigger finger is and what it’s doing. If your fast draw technique results in your finger inadvertently “curling into the trigger guard” and doing things you don’t know about, you are definitely doing something wrong, and can expect exactly this kind of thing to happen.

I would also say, that though it may be fun to develop a fast draw, who draws faster matters in general in Western movies and not in real life. In real life, it is far, far more common for anyone who ever needs to use a gun to have all the time in the world to draw carefully and take deliberate aim.

Tex Grebner, I think, deserves a lot of credit, though, for his forthrightness and considerable courage in releasing both videos, openly exposing a extremely embarrassing mishap, in the cause of making the rest of us think twice about gun safety. Best wishes to him for a quick recovery.


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