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JTarrou  1yr ago (text post)   3629 thread views

I'm a "gun guy", AMA

A couple people had expressed interest in this topic, and I have a bit of extra time for a couple days, so here goes:

Bona fides: I am a former infantry NCO and sniper, hunter, competitive shooter, reloader, hobby gunsmith, sometimes firearms trainer and currently work in a gun shop, mostly on the paperwork/compliance side. Back in the day, was a qualified expert with every standard small arm in the US inventory circa 2003 (M2, 4, 9, 16, 19, 249, 240B, 21, 24, 82 etc.), and today hang around the 75th percentile of USPSA classifications. I've shot Cap-and-Ball, Trap and Sporting Clays badly; Bullseye and PRS somewhat better and IDPA/USPSA/UML/Two-gun with some local success. Been active in the 2A community since the mid-90s, got my first instructor cert in high school, and have held a CPL for almost twenty years now.

I certainly don't claim to be an expert in every aspect of firearms, there's huge areas that escape my knowledge base, but if you've got questions I'll do my best to answer.

Technical questions

Gun control proposals for feasibility

Industry

Training

Wacky opinions

General geekery

Some competition links (not my own) just for the interested.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=U5IhsWamaLY&t=173

https://youtube.com/watch?v=93nEEINflXE

https://youtube.com/watch?v=utcky0zq10E

https://youtube.com/watch?v=xVh4CjbgK7s

https://youtube.com/watch?v=0IK2RUxVq3A

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I am thinking about moving to Alaska. I do lots of outdoors stuff, and given how much wildlife there is in Alaska, safety from it, bears in particular, is a concern much larger than it is for me in lower 48.

Here is the question: do firearms offer higher degree of safety from bears than just bear spray in practice? If yes, which firearms would be an appropriate balance of effectiveness and practicality (size, weight, operational concerns etc)?

I've lived in alaska seasonally and fished there a couple times, and the received wisdom is: Any sub rifle gun is about the same. You will need to get wildly lucky to kill a bear mid attack with a handgun; but the noise and the sting will probably scare him off as well as anything.

Any hunting caliber will kill a bear, but again: if you are getting charged down by a bear, good luck.

The best defense in this case is paying attention and being mindful. You really, really don't want to surprise a brown bear.

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