The Incident at the Gas Station
Are you prepared and ready to defend yourself? Have you gotten training on how to defend yourself? What will you do when you feel threatened?
From the training I’ve learned, I try to apply what I’ve learned and practice as much as I can. There is a lot to remember when it comes to different scenarios and you try to apply what you learn to the situation at hand, especially when you’re under the gun (so to speak). So keep up that training. You never know when you’ll have to use it.
I wanted to share an experience with you that happened the other day and it was the first time I had to put my hand on my pistol grip in public because of something that happened.
I was driving home late at night from a trip, around 2am and was low on gas. I was traveling on the highway and stopped at a small town gas station. They were closed, but I was able to pay at the pump. While I was filling the tank, I was looking around (situational awareness) since it was very dark around the gas station island. You could see the silhouette of the store, but that was about it. Not many lights except the ones lighting up the pumps. While I was pumping gas and looking around, a white sports car drove off the street and parked 2 pumps away from me. After 5 seconds, the car moved to another pump closer to me. Something didn’t feel right and my gut was telling me that there was something wrong. While this was going on, I immediately put my hand on my firearm and kept my hand there while I was moving around my vehicle so I remained out of sight, but still able to see the white car.
Then the car took off and then circled the pumps. This forced me to continuously change my position around my vehicle. I proceeded to move around my SUV to stay out of their sight and in my mind I am thinking “What’s going on here? Why would someone circle the pumps after they already parked in a stall?”
While the pump was still filling my tank, they pulled up to the pump next to me, and stopped at an angle near the bumper of my car. This didn’t look or feel right. Where they trying to block my vehicle? I didn’t know what the reason was and from my training, there is usually more than one person if someone is going to rob you. Criminals usually work in pairs or more.
As soon as the person got out of their car, I pulled out the nozzle, slammed it into pump, jumped into my car and got the hell out of there. As I was driving away, I kept an eye on the sports car and the door swung open. It was a teenager over 6 feet tall as I was driving by. I had no idea what there intentions were. Thinking back as a teenager myself, I have done some dumb things and some to provoke people to get a response from them. Could this teenager been doing the same thing and just messing with me? Or could I have been a possible target on his radar? Was there others inside his car? Whatever the reason for his driving strangely and circling me at the pumps, I didn’t stay around to find out.
After the incident, I began to critique myself on the situation on how I could have done better. What I discovered was that I started to focus on the vehicle while the driver was distracting me and lost focus on my surroundings. So I somewhat tunnel visioned on this white car. While I was moving around my vehicle, I should have also been looking around in case this person may have dropped someone off at the first pump and drove around to distract me so I would get a little surprise from his partner. During the time this car was circling around me, my hand was on the pistol grip, the firearm still in its holster and I was trying to figure out if I am in a bad situation or not.
There are a few other things I later discovered that I could have done a little bit better, like stay near the engine block and the wheels just in case there is a situation where gunfire may happen. Going back to my training, I am glad that I learned some things and the best thing is to get out alive, even if you have to drive away.
Overall, I think I did a pretty good job even if I wasn’t in danger. I think it was the right thing to do and getting home safe to live another day is the most important thing.
Be safe out there, be the responsible firearm owner and always follow the “Concealed Carry Creed”!!
Grandpa “G”
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