Instructors: Please refrain from posting any photos of our attendees.
A midweek Appleseed attended by officers from DHS was attended by thirteen shooters. Shooters used M4 carbines equipped with tactical slings and various sighting systems from carry handles, backup iron sights, Eotechs. For paper target work, only the iron sights were used- no optics.
The attendees' standard practice is to zero at 50m, and thus 4 MOA square and "D" targets were scaled for that range.
There were no 50m redcoat targets, but the officers instead fired on silhouettes for a baseline.
Our officer attendees were attentive, serious, and determined to do well on targets which were, for them, rather small compared to their accustomed paper targets. So Appleseed was able to supply skill-enhancing knowedge to shore the longer range gap.
Shooters learned to judge their performance and corrections in terms of angle.
After morning introductions, I foreshadowed the lunchtime history by mentioning that one cold morning in April, a New England town was shot up, and history changed. People were roused from their beds and assembled with their musket- and their skill- as is, no chance for catching up skill or adjusting things. Officers found themselves in a similar 'predicament' that morning, faced with challenging targets and, in some cases, no chance to practice or verify their zeros prior.
Morning baseline group sizes ranged from 5 to 20+ MOA. In fact, some officers fired rifles for the first time that day.
Instruction followed, point by point, course by course, and groups both shrank and migrated toward point of aim. One challenging aspect of the M4 for use with longer ranges/smaller angular size targets is its short sight radius. It's easier to inflict more error on shot placement as sight radius decreases- some shooters had 11" barrels.
Typical best performance by day's end was in the 4-8 MOA region prone. Our new rifle shooters settled in along with the rest of the group, performing extraordinarily better as we concluded.
Shooters were able to hit the black 100m D target from standing, 200m from sitting, most of the time by the end.
We fired a 50m AQT in the afternoon. The best score I saw was in the 180's.
Having learned what we could at 50m, the group moved on to 200m to conclude the event. The team objective was to be able to hit a 200m man sized target and so, given a chance to do so, each officer fired from standing, sitting, and prone at the 200m target. Some persons hit in all three positions, but everybody was able to hit that target, including our new rifle shooters.
There's nothing like the firm handshake grip of a new shooter who just acquired something of value- I am sure that each instructor walked away with several of those.
I also want to thank the instructor team of Chad, Jeff, and Justin for stepping in to work this midweek event. You all made this a success. Joseph wanted to attend but work required that he not do so. We missed you. There will be a next time.
Great job guys! Thanx for that extra effort!