ktech wrote:ETA: I fully agree that an officer can train to draw, present and fire without any real conscious interaction with the movements; that's not what I thought you were referring to, and if that was what you meant, then I retract my disagreement.
That
is actually what I was referring to, apologies if I wasn't able to make the point well.
In your example, when someone swerves at you while driving, you immediately become very aware if your surroundings. All of your minds attention is focused on situational awareness. You are not thinking about the clutch, the brake, how to turn, etc. the actual act of operating the car is still being performed subconsciously.
However, someone with very little driving experience or training, like a 16 year old who just got their license, hasn't developed the ability to operate their car subconsciously yet. They have to think about the brakes to use them. They have to think about how far to turn the steering wheel to swerve out of the way. Because the mind can only focus on one thing in a high stress situation, having to think to operate the car will limit their situational awareness. This is the main reason that younger drivers have significantly more accidents than older drivers.
The exact same thing happens with a firearm. If you can operate it subconsciously, you are extremely more likely to react better than someone who has to think about sight alignment or trigger squeeze to hit their target in a life threatening encounter.
Also, for whatever reason the act of shooting a firearm is a perishable skill. Once you learn to drive, ride a bike, throw a ball, etc. it pretty much sticks with you. Unfortunately, the ability to shoot a firearm starts to diminish as quickly as several weeks without shooting, maybe a month or so it best. Without ongoing training someone who
had been able to operate their weapon effectively without thinking
will eventually lose that ability.
I have seen a few cops whose firearms handling ability I would characterize as similar to the driving ability of a 16 year old. As long as they are able to concentrate on operating their weapon, they are able to pass a proficiency test. Unfortunately, in a real world encounter they will have a
significantly more difficult time reacting effectively than someone who has had the necessary training to develop and preserve their skills.
Without passing judgement on the officers involved in the incident, it appears to me from their actions that they may not have had the training necessary to allow them to both focus on the situational awareness, and be able to operate their weapons effectively at the same time. It's only my opinion, but if I'm correct I would hope that someone at NYPD would come to the same conclusion, and provide greater training opportunities for their officers in the future.