Year: 2010

I regret to have to announce that the classes scheduled for Live Oak, FL, Oct 23-24 have been cancelled. We simply didn’t have enough people register to justify the travel expenses.

This is something I hate having to do, but it is simply unavoidable. The training I offer under the Tactical Anatomy rubric isn’t my bread-and-butter, but is rather something I do as a way of giving back to the community of law enforcement and defensive-minded citizens some of what I have received over the years in my own journey toward knowledge. As such, I really don’t expect to make much of a profit. If I were to bill Tactical Anatomy Systems   what I charge for my medical services, TAS would have been bankrupt long ago. But still, I have to meet the basic expenses of a training trip, and if I can’t come at least close to that, I have no choice but to cancel the training.

To those of you who registered, my thanks. I will be issuing refund checks shortly. I have been in contact with Steve Denney at ProArms and we are considering the possibility of trying to schedule a class again in the spring. So keep an eye on the website so you can be apprised of new developments. 

We have online registration for both Shooting With Xray Vision for Civilians and Tactical Treatment of Gunshot Wounds set up now on the website. If you want to register for either of these classes, go to the SCHEDULE page, scroll down to the box with the event schedule in it, and left-click your mouse. You will be re-directed to a page where you will be able to click an "Add To Cart" button. From there it should be so easy a caveman could do it. If it doesn’t work for you, email me and I’ll figure out how to make it work.

Please note that the TTGSW course description on this page is erroneous. We are working on correcting this.

If you do NOT want to use a credit card or PayPal to register for these classes, you can register by snail-mail by sending me your name, home address, REAL phone number (i.e., the one you actually answer), and a copy of some document that proves you’re a genuine Good Guy/Girl… a copy of your CCW license, a state-issued medical/dental/paramedic/etc license, a copy of a Lethal Force Institute or MassadAyoobGroup diploma, or whatever else you think qualifies you as a Good Person. Point being I don’t teach this stuff to felons. Anyway, if you send me your stuff and a check to P.O. Box 183, Ripon, WI 54971, that’ll work.

Any further questions you might have, please contact Steve Denney at 386-364-4867, or contact me by email or phone. Doc out.

Friends, I must apologize for my lack of attention to the website for the past several months. I am looking into hiring a part-time webminder who can provide updates and do site maintenance for me, since I clearly am juggling too many chainsaws as it is. 

First thing, in response to all the emails: Yes, we are holding CLASSES IN LIVE OAK FLORIDA in October!!

Sorry about the "shouting", but I wanted to get it out there. I will be teaching at a law enforcement seminar in Tallahasee that week, and in conjunction with my friends Massad Ayoob and Steve Denney we decided to piggback a couple of classes for civilians onto the trip. We will be holding an 8-hour "Shooting With Xray Vision for Civilians" class on Saturday, Oct. 23, and an 8-hour "Tactical Treatment of Gunshot Wounds" class on Sunday, Oct. 24. 

"Shooting With Xray Vision for Civilians" has proven to be a highly popular course among defensively-enabled shooters in the upper midwest over the past couple of years, and this is the first time we’re going to take it on the road. This 8-hour course is designed for the tactically/defensively-aware private citizen who has no more than the average layman’s knowledge of human anatomy and physiology, wound ballistics, and legal aspects of the use of deadly force. I STRONGLY recommend that anyone thinking of taking this class get Massad Ayoob’s MAG-20 (formerly, "Jucicious Use of Deadly Force", or LFI-I) class under their belt as soon as possible, since many of the subtleties of the use of deadly force he covers are assumed to be in the student’s memory banks prior to taking Xray Vision. In this class we will cover the political, ethical, and legal realities of the use of deadly force;  real-world gunfight realities; basics of wound ballistics; "caliber wars", or what calibers and bullets will/won’t serve you well in the real world; gunshot wounds and incapacitation;  and a comprehensive review of vital human anatomy in 3 dimension. All materials required will be supplied. Cost of this course is $150 per person.

"Tactical Treatment of Gunshot Wounds" (aka "TTGSW") is a relatively new course I developed in response to requests from several major metro police departments, and has become basic academy and inservice curriculum in several locales, most notably Metro Nashville (TN) Police Department. This 8-hour class is designed to give the layman a basic but highly useful approach to assessing, treating, and stabilizing injuries due to GSWs and other violent major trauma. We will cover the major traumatic threats to survival in a battlefield environment: catastrophic extremity hemmorhage, and ventilatory failure (tension pneumothorax, flail chest, "sucking chest wound", airway obstruction). We will cover the basic but highly effective techniques used to address these problems, including use of tourniquets, battlefield dressings (eg, Israeli Battle Dressing, etc), oropharyngeal and nasopharyngeal airways, needle thoracostomy, and Asherman chest seal. Attendees will receive detailed information on the recommended components for a basic personal "blowout kit", as well as recommended components of a major trauma team kit, and supplier information. We will also cover theory and practice of treatment of major trauma in the "hot zone", extrication techniques, and will round out the day with "Mega-Code" exercises utilizing simulated battle wounds under live-fire conditions. All medical equipment and materials will be supplied. Students will need to bring a serviceable handgun and/or rifle with 100 rounds of ammunition per firearm, as well as standard eye and ear protection. Cost for this course is $150 per person. 

Attendance at either of the above classes requires advance registration and payment through the website. Online registration should be up and running by 8/25, or I’ll be hunting down my webmaster with my 338 Lapua…  But seriously, it will be in place shortly. All registrants MUST provide a copy of their bona fides (a valid CCW license, LE ID card, or letter from an Officer of the Court attesting to one’s good character and lack of criminal convictions) prior to class. No one will be permitted to attend these classes without documentation proving you’re a genuine Good Guy/Good Girl. 

Students enrolling in both classes will get a $50 break on the total price ($250/person for both days). 

We also have plans in place to conduct a Law Enforcement-only Shooting With Xray Vision class on Friday, Oct. 22. If you’re LE or active military and want to access that class, contact myself through this website or Steve Denney (steve@proarmsinc.com, 386-364-4867)  in Live Oak and let us know. We’ll give you the goods once we establish comms. 

See y’all in Live Oak. 

My friends, 2010 has been a hectic Charlie Foxtrot so far, but things have started to settle down. I sold my house (unbelievable in this current real estate market!) which necessitated A Move. It’s been 14 years since my last Move, so I had forgotten what a purgatorial experience it is. The house deal closed Feb. 12, which basically meant I spent most of January sorting, packing, and throwing away stuff, and most of February moving, unpacking, sorting, and throwing away stuff.

The good news is that all of my major rooms are unpacked and, and thanks to my loving and ever-protective daughters, arranged and set up in a manner that could pass for "decorated". My son, who moved back from the West Coast just before Christmas and has been living with me temporarily, was also instrumental in The Move, i.e., he did all the heavy lifting that the movers wouldn’t do. I am blessed to be in my new home, out from under a cripplingly expensive mortgage and second mortgage, and able to start putting money toward my dream of a log house in the woods. (With pre-established fields of observation and fire and fixed emplacements for crew-served weapons, of course…)

So despite the fact that my reloading room is still unpacked, I am able to once again resume my Tactical Anatomy duties. Those of  you who have ordered items in the past couple of weeks, please accept my apologies for being tardy, but your orders will be shipped this week… and new memberships on this site will be vetted and processed.

I am pleased to announce that Tactical Anatomy Systems has taken another step forward in the training world. We have purchased a MILO computer simulator system, and are now offering training using this incredible modality. I have had opportunities to train on most of the computer simulator systems out there including the industry originator FATS system, but in my considered opinion no system is competitive with MILO. Which is why I bought it and am offering it for training.

My lead firearms instructor, David K. Maglio, and I held our first pilot project MILO class on Feb. 20, 2010. We have dubbed it Deadly Force Decisions, and modelled it on the excellent training with this system we have both received from various agencies in Wisconsin, including our close training compadres at Milwaukee PD. Suffice to say that the pilot project was an overwhelming success.

As a result, we are making plans to incorporate Deadly Force Decisions with our already popular Shooting with Xray Vision class, and our recently introduced SIMUNITION-based Tactical Anatomy Force-on-Force program. We are offering all three classes in a single weekend, with options to all attendees to take any or all of the 3 classes. David, who is a Certified SIMUNITION instructor as well as a Wisconsin DOJ-certified law enforcement firearms instructor, has run several Force-on-Force classes for non-sworn personnel under the Tactical Anatomy umbrella now, and we are confident that this is as cutting-edge hands-on deadly force training as you can get anywhere, taught by guys who are experienced and fully qualified instructors first and foremost. 

Our first offering of the Deadly Force Workshop will be in the Twin Cities March 6-7. We are looking forward  to holding more of these Workshops throughout the upper midwest this spring and summer, for both LE and non-sworn personnel. Contact us through this website if you are interested in attending or hosting a Workshop, or any one component of our deadly force training triad.