flatblack

I've been in my annual training this week. Today was taser training. It was actually very interesting. These tasers shoot out two pointed barbs attached to very thin wires so that they can hit targets more than 20 feet away. It's a relatively high wattage low amp charge. How it works it's magic is the the electrical impulses match the wave patterns of the electrical impulses the body uses to control it's muscles. Thus, your muscles contact involuntarily. The barbs stick into the body so that if the subject starts to act up, you can just hit the juice again as many times as you need to and never have to touch them until they do what you want between 5 second shocks. A coat won't defeat it either. The barbs only have to get within a couple inches of the skin to work and it will arch and still shock then.

It wasn't mandatory, but they asked for volunteers to come up and get zapped in front of the class as a demonstration. It also helps when testifying in court that you have had the taser used on you as part of training and you know exactly what it feels like. You had the choice of either having the wires taped to you and being hit with the charge for just a second, or have the barbs shot at you and going through the full five second cycle that the gun normally goes through.

I of course had to show that I was just as much of a bad ass as anyone else, and not only volunteered, but went for the barbs and the full 5 second shock. This is the only result that shows any mark afterwards:

They shoot you in the back for safety so that you don't accidentally get hit in the throat or eye. I think most of this redness is actually from pulling off the bandaid:


As you can see, it doesn't do much damage. This is the wave of the future in law enforcement. So far in life, I've been shot (just shrapnel from a ricochet), struck with and expandable baton (training accident), pepper sprayed (both as part of training and indirect exposure many times) and now zapped with a taser. This disabled me far more than anything else with no lasting affects after the juice was off. They've even pepper sprayed us and then had us fight a guy in a padded suit as part of training before.

You don't even feel the barbs in your skin. It made every muscle in my body clench up, it knocked the wind out of me, and I dropped to the ground instantly. I was completely aware of what was going on around me and what was being said. I just couldn't couldn't move. I wasn't even aware of it, but apparently after a few seconds, my legs started jerking like they were trying to run while I way laying face down on the mat. The first two seconds were pretty damn uncomfortable, but those last three seconds before the gun cuts it's charge off sucked in ways I could never describe and seemed to last forever.

I didn't realize they would be tasing us today, or I would have recored it and posted it somewhere for everyone.