When an active shooter attack begins, time immediately becomes one of the most important factors in determining what happens next.

In this episode of Making Shooters Better, Terry Vaughan speaks with Ed Monk, a retired Army officer, former law enforcement officer, firearms instructor, author, and longtime researcher of active shooter events. Ed has spent nearly two decades examining these attacks and the response strategies commonly used to prepare for them.

His central argument is challenging but straightforward: if innocent people can be shot within seconds, a response plan has to account for what happens before outside help can realistically arrive.

Why the First 30 Seconds Matter

Ed describes an active shooter attack as fundamentally a problem of time. The attacker may enter a crowded location prepared to cause harm while the people around them are still trying to understand what is happening.

According to Ed's analysis of previous attacks, victims can be shot rapidly during the opening moments. That makes the time between the first shot and an effective response especially significant.

Recognition Does Not Always Happen Immediately

One important part of the discussion is something that can easily be overlooked: people may not immediately recognize gunfire for what it is.

Someone hearing unexpected shots inside a building may initially interpret the sound as something familiar, such as fireworks, construction noise, falling objects, or another everyday sound. Meanwhile, people directly exposed to the attack may be focused entirely on escaping or protecting themselves rather than reaching for a phone.

Ed argues that this can create a critical delay before someone contacts 911. Only after that call is received can law enforcement be dispatched, travel to the location, enter the correct area, locate the attacker, and intervene.

Victim Time and Response Time Are Different

Ed makes an important distinction between what he calls victim time and police time.

For victims, the clock starts with the first shot. For responding officers, the operational clock effectively begins later, once the attack has been reported and information has reached them.

This distinction is central to Ed's work because it changes the question from simply, “How quickly can help arrive?” to, “What can happen before help even knows an attack is underway?”

Rethinking Conventional Response Plans

Much of the conversation focuses on conventional approaches such as lockdown procedures and Run-Hide-Fight.

Ed's concern is not that evacuation, barricading, or calling law enforcement have no value. Instead, he challenges response plans that treat waiting for outside intervention as the primary solution while an attacker remains free to continue harming people.

When Lockdown Is Not Enough

Locking and barricading a room can create an important obstacle between people and an attacker. But Ed argues that it should not automatically be treated as a complete solution in every environment.

Different people and locations may require different decisions. A daycare, hospital, nursing facility, or special-needs classroom may face very different evacuation challenges than able-bodied adults near a usable exit.

That means planning should consider real conditions rather than relying entirely on a single response for everyone.

Fight, Escape, or Barricade

One of Ed's strongest arguments is that people who are physically and mentally capable of intervening should think about that possibility before an emergency occurs.

Not everyone should respond in the same way. Circumstances, capabilities, proximity, available exits, and the presence of people who need assistance can all affect the decision.

Ed's broader point is that preparation should realistically address all of the available options:

  • Intervening when someone has the capability and circumstances to do so
  • Creating distance and getting away from the attacker when escape is available
  • Barricading when escape or intervention is not realistically possible

Thinking through those choices beforehand can help create what Ed describes as a mental “parking spot”—a decision that has already been considered before someone is forced to make it under extreme stress.

The Psychological Barrier to Acting

Technical skills are only part of emergency preparation. The episode also explores the psychological difficulty of deliberately using force against another person.

Most responsible people do not want to hurt someone. In ordinary life, that reluctance is a good thing. An emergency involving immediate deadly violence, however, creates a radically different set of circumstances.

Terry and Ed discuss how people may find it easier to understand decisive action when they frame it around protecting someone else. The willingness to defend a child, family member, coworker, student, or other innocent person can be very different from the way someone thinks about protecting only themselves.

Preparation Has to Include Decision-Making

Ed encourages people who may have a protective responsibility to consider difficult questions before an emergency occurs.

  • What circumstances would cause you to act?
  • What are you physically capable of doing?
  • What tools would legally be available?
  • What level of skill do you actually have?
  • Can you make responsible decisions while experiencing extreme stress?

These questions matter because possessing equipment is not the same thing as being prepared to use it responsibly.

What Armed Responders Need to Understand

The conversation becomes especially relevant to firearms training when Ed discusses the responsibilities of an armed person who chooses to intervene.

Active shooter response can present a very different shooting problem from the close-range defensive encounters that make up much of traditional personal-protection training.

Distance may be greater. People may be moving in multiple directions. Innocent people may be close to or beyond the attacker. Stress may create an overwhelming desire to act immediately.

All of those factors make accountability essential.

There Are No Harmless Misses

On a traditional shooting range, a round that misses the intended target may safely enter a designated backstop. That environment can unintentionally create a simple mental distinction between hits and misses.

A crowded public environment is completely different.

As Ed explains, every round ultimately goes somewhere. An armed responder therefore has to account not only for the intended target but also for other people who may be beyond, beside, or even hidden behind that person.

For Ed, this changes the standard from simply trying to hit the target to knowing when a shot can be taken responsibly.

Know the Limits of Your Accuracy

One of the most practical training concepts Ed discusses is understanding your personal accuracy limit.

A qualification score alone does not necessarily answer the question an armed responder may actually need answered: at what distance can I consistently produce accountable hits with this firearm?

Ed uses a progressive-distance exercise in his training to help shooters identify that boundary. Shooters begin closer to the target and gradually increase distance while maintaining a defined accuracy standard.

The purpose is not to prove how far someone can shoot. It is to identify the point where their current ability stops providing the consistency the situation demands.

That is an important distinction for responsible firearms training. Knowing what you cannot reliably do can be just as valuable as knowing what you can.

Managing “The Monkey” Under Stress

Ed uses the term “the monkey” to describe the internal pressure that can develop during an active shooter response.

At first, that pressure may be telling a responder to move quickly because innocent people remain in danger. But once the responder encounters the attacker, that same urgency can become dangerous if it pushes the person beyond their actual shooting ability.

The pressure can effectively become:

  • Shoot now
  • Shoot faster
  • Engage from farther away
  • Do something immediately

Ed's training emphasizes controlling that impulse. Urgency does not eliminate the responsibility to make an accountable decision.

Speed Cannot Replace Control

A shooter may be capable of making reliable hits at a certain distance when working at a controlled pace but lose that ability when firing significantly faster.

That means competence is not simply a question of whether someone can hit a target at a particular distance. The shooter must also understand the relationship between distance, pace, accuracy, stress, and their current skill level.

This is where realistic firearms training becomes especially valuable. Training should build both technical ability and the judgment required to apply that ability responsibly.

Training Beyond the Typical Defensive Encounter

Ed points out that most armed citizens understandably devote the majority of their defensive firearms training to more common close-range threats.

That makes sense. But someone who intends to be prepared to respond to a larger public attack should recognize that it presents additional problems.

Training considerations may include:

  • Understanding personal accuracy limits at varying distances
  • Maintaining awareness of innocent people around and beyond the threat
  • Controlling shooting pace under stress
  • Making decisions rather than simply reacting to a target
  • Understanding how ammunition and equipment perform
  • Practicing visual accountability and responsible target identification
  • Recognizing when a shot should not be taken

Dry-fire practice can help reinforce fundamentals such as sight management, trigger control, presentation, and deliberate decision-making when performed safely with an unloaded firearm and an appropriate training system. It should complement, not replace, responsible live-fire training.

Preparation Has to Match the Problem

A recurring theme throughout the episode is the difference between preparing for what is comfortable to discuss and preparing for what could actually happen.

Ed encourages schools, churches, businesses, law enforcement agencies, and individuals with protective responsibilities to examine their plans critically.

That does not mean every person should respond identically. It means plans should acknowledge time, human behavior, physical capability, environmental limitations, and the realities of responsible intervention.

Effective preparation should also recognize that an emergency may force people to make difficult decisions before professional responders can reach them.

Watch the Full Conversation

This episode goes much deeper than any single response model or firearms drill. Terry and Ed explore the timeline of active shooter attacks, human reactions to unexpected violence, the responsibilities of armed and unarmed responders, and the difficult balance between acting quickly and acting responsibly.

Watch the full episode of Making Shooters Better to hear Ed explain the reasoning behind his approach, including his “rule four,” “round two,” and “the monkey” training concepts. The complete discussion provides important context for understanding why he believes active shooter preparation must focus more closely on the opening moments of an attack.

For more conversations about responsible firearms ownership, training, skill development, and practical preparation, subscribe to Laser Ammo's channel and follow Making Shooters Better.

Learn More From Ed Monk

Ed travels around the country providing presentations and training for law enforcement agencies, schools, churches, conferences, and other organizations. His programs include active shooter response presentations as well as firearms training focused on the challenges armed responders may face.

His book, First 30 Seconds, expands on many of the concepts discussed in this episode, including the role of time in active shooter attacks and the decisions people may face before outside responders arrive.

Follow Ed's work and look for First 30 Seconds if you want to explore his research, training approach, and analysis in greater depth. Follow Ed on Facebook here.

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