Home Brew FBI Load Fail

[Lance Boyle]

I never counted on any "handgun" bullet to reliably expand 100% of the time, nor did I ever expect any "handgun" bullet to pass thru a windshield and strike its intended target. It may, or may not. Far too many variables to make any statements about such things, especially with the lower velocity of handgun ammunition. If you obtain bullet expansion from a handgun in any and all conditions you are most fortunate and really should start buying lottery tickets. FYI, I never carry reloads for self defense use, only known high quality ammunition at above average speed. It must go bang when I pull the trigger. Bullet expansion is secondary to hitting my intended target.

Does the FBI do a good job of ballistic testing? Certainly they do. They have the funding for such endeavors where most other departments do not. They have the funding to not only test ammunition and such, but also to purchase what they feel is best for their agents at that time. Some departments are so ill funded that their officers may carry a certain firearm for over a decade even though better items are out there and available. On a department living on a shoe string budget money for firearms and ammunition is way down on the list of needed purchases, except for qualification shoots some of which may only be once a year. The days of obtaining ammunition from your department to practice with are pretty much over.

There were far more issues with the infamous Miami FBI shootout than firearms and ammunition. One really has to read the final reports on this incident to get a clear understanding of what went wrong. I drew my own conclusions from this event a long time ago and a big problem was simple communication. Letting others know what you are doing so they can assist if needed. And that is still a problem to this very day.

Rick H.

Speaking of shoestring budgets… it’s a real factor for agencies and regular people.
-In my younger days I remember in the late 80’s a local news story of one of the local town PDs issuing a new hire an N frame in .45 Colt. He carried it for several months BEFORE attending the local academy where he was to shoot it. It didn’t work, he’d been carrying the old department gun with a busted hammer nose. The union made a stink about it.

- our agency had its issues procuring ammo. Often times it was the market not the budget, we couldn’t get the ammo we had on contract. I went 2.5 years without qualifying. Our politician in charge didn’t care as he legally wasn’t required to have us shoot. We literally only had to qualify once to get certified and graduate the academy. Never mind that we always had previously qualified twice a year. Our sister agency were peace officers, not like us, police officers. State law legal distinction. They according to the law had to shoot at least once a year to carry.

Another time when ammo was moderately tight we got in the annual order and the percentage for our sister agency was picked up by them. They shot it all up in their spring training but not shoot their actual qualifying course which they intended to shoot in the fall. Come fall they call up our QM or Senior Firearms guy (they had their own firearms training team) and wanted their fall ammunition. Our guy laughed at them, you got it already in the Spring, what did you do with it? Oh,…we shot it all doing training drills, we wondered why we got so much ammo. Well because they were peace officers and were required to shoot their qualification course the Commissioner forced our side to give them our fall ammo instead of making them find some of their own budget money to buy more ammo. We got shafted…..again.