Disclaimer: These are just my opinions. They are informed by nearly 60 years of firearms experience, being shot at and occasionally shooting back, and making a living at it for a good chunk of that time. With that said, they are still ONLY my opinions, neither infallible nor holy writ. Take them as you will. I bear no grudges against folks who think otherwise. Whenever you strap on a side arm, you are betting your life on that choice, so it is a highly personal choice, not subject to the vagaries of the whims of other folks - they are not betting THEIR lives on what YOU choose to carry, so they, and I, can just bugger right off if their opinion differs. You do you, and carry what you want.
Recently, and for the past few years, Sig has been getting flak for their P320 sidearms, because said side arms appear to have a habit of going off all on their own, with no user input. Folks have been injured in those incidents, folks have died in them. My question is: who in the hell thought it was a good idea to carry a gun with no external hammer, and no external manually operated safety? For my carry options, those two things are mandatory. I will not carry a weapon without them, because I consider all striker-fired pistols, including your beloved Glock, to be inherently unsafe... not to mention the horrendous ungainly "ergonomics" engineered into Glocks. They fit me like trying to shoot a 2x4 one-handed would fit me.
That can be a problem in this day and age, since more and more striker-fired pistols are flooding the market. It's getting to be where that is all one can find, and that presents a problem for folks like me, who prioritize safety in a firearm. I'll tell you true: I would carry a club for self defense before I would carry one of those unsafe monstrosities. That's not hyperbole - I have a couple of ASP extendable batons for just such occasions.
Luckily, I already have all the firearms I'm ever going to need or use already, even though some of them would be considered dinosaurs by "modern" standards. Like you, I will carry what I damned well please, because it's my life I'm betting on it, not yours.
To be fair, the military version of the P320, the M-17 and M-18, both are supposed to have external manual safeties... but they are still damnable striker-fires, so a no-go at this station. The most recent incident involves a USAF Security Airman being killed by a holstered P320, so to my way of thinking, that external safety may be just as poorly designed and engineered as the entire striker-fired concept in pistols.
Bottom line, there is no such thing as a "safe" pistol without 1) an external hammer, 2) a manual safety lever that blocks ignition train operation, and 3) an ability to be safely de-cocked. If the pistol you are looking to purchase does not have all 3 of those things, my considered recommendation is to just keep looking, and carry a club instead until you find a pistol that does have all 3.
Better safe than sorry. You don't usually get do-overs or respawns in real world shootings.
.
Recently, and for the past few years, Sig has been getting flak for their P320 sidearms, because said side arms appear to have a habit of going off all on their own, with no user input. Folks have been injured in those incidents, folks have died in them. My question is: who in the hell thought it was a good idea to carry a gun with no external hammer, and no external manually operated safety? For my carry options, those two things are mandatory. I will not carry a weapon without them, because I consider all striker-fired pistols, including your beloved Glock, to be inherently unsafe... not to mention the horrendous ungainly "ergonomics" engineered into Glocks. They fit me like trying to shoot a 2x4 one-handed would fit me.
That can be a problem in this day and age, since more and more striker-fired pistols are flooding the market. It's getting to be where that is all one can find, and that presents a problem for folks like me, who prioritize safety in a firearm. I'll tell you true: I would carry a club for self defense before I would carry one of those unsafe monstrosities. That's not hyperbole - I have a couple of ASP extendable batons for just such occasions.
Luckily, I already have all the firearms I'm ever going to need or use already, even though some of them would be considered dinosaurs by "modern" standards. Like you, I will carry what I damned well please, because it's my life I'm betting on it, not yours.
To be fair, the military version of the P320, the M-17 and M-18, both are supposed to have external manual safeties... but they are still damnable striker-fires, so a no-go at this station. The most recent incident involves a USAF Security Airman being killed by a holstered P320, so to my way of thinking, that external safety may be just as poorly designed and engineered as the entire striker-fired concept in pistols.
Bottom line, there is no such thing as a "safe" pistol without 1) an external hammer, 2) a manual safety lever that blocks ignition train operation, and 3) an ability to be safely de-cocked. If the pistol you are looking to purchase does not have all 3 of those things, my considered recommendation is to just keep looking, and carry a club instead until you find a pistol that does have all 3.
Better safe than sorry. You don't usually get do-overs or respawns in real world shootings.
.
“Trouble rather the tiger in his lair than the sage among his books. For to you kingdoms and their armies are things mighty and enduring, but to him they are but toys of the moment, to be overturned with the flick of a finger.”
― Gordon R. Dickson, Tactics of Mistake
― Gordon R. Dickson, Tactics of Mistake
