Avoid, Evade, Escape, 3

Stephen asks a good question regarding my p0st in "Avoid, Evade, Escape, 2":

You mentioned a family-type scenario earlier in the post, how does a family work together to eliminate a threat?

I'm thinking mainly along the lines of father/son cooperation but possibly also brother/sister or husband/wife teams.

There's a pretty sharp young guy who has a rather exclusive invitation-only blogsite. If all my readers could go there, I'd recommend that they look over his series on tactics. It provides an excellent overview that can be adapted to family defense.

Tactical elements include communication, movement and fighting. I won't say much about fighting, because if more than one train in a family, they can work out for themselves how to cover each other's back and how to stay out of each other's way.

Communication should be simple and easy to remember. "Orc alert at ten o'clock," for example, when one spots a suspicious character loitering ahead.

Ten o'clock refers not to time, but to position. Imagine standing on the center of a large clock face with the twelve straight ahead. Three o'clock would be on your left, nine on your right, and six to your rear. Ten o'clock would be to the left, a little forward of the nine o'clock position.

If you've ever watched NCIS, sometimes Gibbs will say to one of his agents, "On my six." He means, "Follow me (walk where six o'clock would be if I were standing on a clockface)."

This is just one example of direct, but terse, communication. A family should have this kind of communication capability. One of my daughters and her husband have taught signing (the hand signs used by the deaf and mute) to their children.

Thus, family members are able to communicate with each other silently so as not to disrupt a conversation or a church service. They can also "talk" to each other in noisy environments without trying to shout over the din.

Since coordinated movement often depends on it, I would make good communication a priority.