Imagine your spouse, who will deliver a new baby in a matter of weeks, shakes you.
“I need some chocolate ice cream, dear. Will you go get me some?”It’s 3 in the morning. You were sound asleep. You want to say no. You might want to say more, but you think before you speak. You turn on the light, stretch, pull on your pants and concealed carry pistol, give your spouse a kiss, and head out to the all-night convenience store. Sure, you grumble a bit, but you remember who’s doing the heavy lifting baby-wise.The streets are deserted and you allow yourself to remain in the semi-fog of sleep until you’re pulling into the parking lot. The store is bright, but the lot is poorly lighted by a flickering mercury vapor overhead lamp. You get out of the car and, suddenly, you are face-to-face with a couple punks, one of whom shows a knife.You back away and draw your pistol. He lunges. You fire once, twice and you realize you’re blinded by the muzzle flash. What happens next is up in the air, and you could live or die by the results.
At the Range
We go to the range regularly. It’s brightly lighted. We wear safety glasses and earmuffs. Sound baffles of various designs are installed on either side. We adjust the target distance, take a stance, raise our gun, take careful aim and squeeze.At the local range or even at a training course, we might simulate holding with the Harries technique, a flashlight in an ice-pick grip, one hand beneath and bracing our dominant hand with the gun. We’re careful, thoughtful. We wait for commands like “range is clear” and beeps from little plastic boxes.It’s a whole lot different in real life. In real life, an encounter takes place suddenly, unexpectedly. In real life, the muzzle blast, especially if you’re half-asleep, will be startling and the muzzle flash might be blinding. In real life, you won’t have a chance to use a hand-held flashlight. Cops use flashlights and train for low-light encounters, but a true self-defense situation from a private citizen’s point of view will rarely involve anything but a sidearm.
What is Muzzle Flash?
Muzzle flash is the visible and infrared light emitted when a cartridge fires, and it is generated by burning gunpowder mixing with oxygen. The size and shape of the muzzle flash, as well as its intensity, are dependent on several things: the type of ammunition or composition of the cartridge being fired; the characteristics of the firearm, such as length of the barrel, whether it is a revolver or pistol and the presence or absence of porting; and whether there are devices attached to the gun at the muzzle, such as a muzzle brake or flash suppressor.Writing principally about naval weaponry, retired Electrical Design Engineer Tony DiGiulian at NavWeaps says that only about 30 percent of the chemical energy released from the propellant is converted into the useful kinetic energy of actually moving the projectile down the barrel. The rest is, in a sense, “trash energy” that is dissipated in the muzzle flash. DiGiulian say there are five components to muzzle flash:
- Muzzle Glow — The tiny tongue of flame and unburned propellants that leak past the bullet and exit the muzzle before the bullet leaves the barrel. It persists until chamber pressure drops significantly as the heavy, inert bullet is separated from the case and pushed down the barrel. A cold gun (or a new gun with a lubricated barrel) will show less muzzle glow than a hot gun.
- Primary Flash — The propellant gases that exit the muzzle behind the projectile. These are hot enough to emit large amounts of visible radiation but cool rapidly as they expand away from the muzzle.
- Intermediate Flash — A reddish disc, slightly dished toward the gun, a few inches from the muzzle at the time the bullet leaves the barrel. It persists until chamber pressure drops. This is called a “Mach shock wave” and it is created by pressure from the escaping gas and bullet, which cause the escaping gas to heat and become “self-luminescent.”
- Secondary Flash — The ragged vortex of yellowish-white flame caused by the ignition of the turbulent, combustible mix of propellant gases and atmospheric oxygen caused by the turbulent mixing occurring at the boundary of the gas jet as it leaves the muzzle.
- Sparks — Common to all small arms, these are incompletely burned, residual powder particles.
SHOWN HERE IS THE BLAST from a Remington R1911 in the “Secondary Flash” phase, or the phase of the muzzle flash comprised mostly of long tongues of flame.