Maine candidate: Fire extinguishers 'great deterrent' for guns

[DonViejo]

Source: The Hill




BY REID WILSON - 03/06/18 10:59 AM EST

A leading Republican contender running to be the next governor of Maine said in a radio interview Monday that teachers could use fire extinguishers to combat an active shooter in a school.

Shawn Moody, a state university system trustee who ran in 2010, told a radio interviewer he supports gun rights, and that the mental health system and law enforcement had failed to prevent the shootings at a Parkland, Fla., high school. But, he said, instead of passing new restrictions on gun rights, teachers could use fire extinguishers that are already in every school.

“When you think about common sense things, practical things we could do like, right now, there are fire extinguishers, dry chemical fire extinguishers in every commercial building, school, almost within a hundred feet of wherever you are. And a fire extinguisher can be a great deterrent if somebody gets out of control, or somebody, if anything happens, a teacher, anybody, can break that glass, set the alarm off, grab that chemical fire extinguisher and spray it towards somebody. And I’ll tell you right now that could put them to their knees,” Moody said. Moody’s campaign did not immediately respond to a request for additional comment.

Moody is one of five Republicans running to replace term-limited Gov. Paul LePage (R). A dozen candidates are running for the Democratic nomination.

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Read more: http://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/376931-maine-candidate-fire-extinguishers-great-deterrent-for-guns

[bucolic_frolic]

1. Wait. Did this guy fight World War II with a fire extinguisher?

He needs a psy evaluation every bit as much as Donald J. Trump

[Dave Starsky]

18. My grandfather stormed Omaha Beach with a bucket of baking soda.

They didn't have these fancy A-B-C fire extinguishers back then.

[Angry Dragon]

2. I feel so much safer now

[C Moon]

3. Whew. Reading the headline, I thought this was someone from our side of the aisle.

I guess because it wasn't backing teachers having guns.

[Old Crank]

4. If the school is up to

code then there is a fire finisher every 75 feet.
If I had nothing else and was in the hall the dry chemical extinguisher wouldn't be a bad option.
I would first try to get around a corner and out of the line of fire.

[mac56]

9. You can't be serious.

[Igel]

21. It's not a horrible idea.

We act like the alternative is all hunky-dory. "Teacher doesn't have a gun, everything'll be fine." But Stoneman was the consequence.

Here's how lock-down drills go where I work.

1. Problem's claimed to be identified: Armed intruder, shots fired.
2. Teachers pull every kid near their room into their room. They make sure the door's locked and cover any windows into the classroom. Kill the lights. Try to bar the door in some way--put stuff in front of it, tie the handle so it's hard to open.
3. Wait quietly until the all-clear's sounded.

If (3) wasn't going to happen because it wasn't a drill, we'd wait until either the killer was killed someplace else or until he picked my room's door and tried to get through. I'm not sure my teens would stay quiet. If he doesn't get through, then we wait until the killer is killed someplace else.

If he does get through, then we're 30 or so people, one middle-aged unarmed male and around 30 teens, against a killer who'll come in when he's ready, shooting at will. Right now I'd be holding whatever it was I could use to try to club or hurt him. Perhaps a meter stick. Perhaps a bottle of whiteboard fluid. Perhaps I'd have pulled a desk draw out of my desk to use it as a club. No, all of these sound really, really lame.

Now, if I were armed (let's say for the sake of argument I qualifed, was allowed, and wanted to be) then I could be sitting there aiming at the one way he has of getting into my room. I'm already at risk, there's no increased risk during this actual encounter, and he's brought the fight to me.

But if I'm out in the hall anyway rounding up students, it wouldn't hurt to grab a fire extinguisher. He doesn't have to actually get that far through the door or close to me for me to be able to slow him down. Sure, he's shooting and now we've pissed him off. But really, he's already coming at us with a gun to kill us, so that's not really a downside. Once he's got vision and breathing problems, that heavy metal thing would make a great object to smash his face or skull with.
Now, let's say I'm not armed.

We insist on trying to say that during a lock-down drill teachers are going to pour out of their classrooms, leaving their kids undefended, in order to shoot the guy. That's not where the fight usually is. In every school shooting, kids are easy targets in the hall and outside, but those targets typically vanish real quick and sometimes those killed or wounded aren't that large a number. Then the gunman goes into classrooms, which have one entrance, are fairly open, and stuffed with terrified students, and that's where the serious killing typically happens.

[Old Crank]

28. I said

If I was stuck in a hall with no other options......

[FSogol]

15. Wow! Almost like a movie! You could dive for the fire extinguisher cabinet and blast the shooter

before he lets loose with his beloved AR15!

Pew, pew, pew!

Make sure you think of something witty to say, like stick around, or that extinguishes you!

If I can just get around the corner!

Pew, pew, pew!

[Dave Starsky]

19. "Fire finisher"?

You know a lot about US fire codes for someone who refers to extinguishers as "fire finishers", unless this is some sort of odd regional slang I've never heard before.

I only point out your strange choice of words because what you wrote is patently ridiculous.

[IronLionZion]

20. Is that how they do it in Germany?

a country that has very few mass shootings for very different reasons.

[Locrian]

5. never bring a fire extinguisher to a gun fight...

but I'd like to see him try

[Blues Heron]

6. Sure

if the guy showed up with a flame thrower maybe... otherwise TF?

[old guy]

7. Text books, fire extinguishers, an unarmed POTUS charging in to save the day!

No need for anything else. Move along people, nothing to see here.

[brooklynite]

8. "Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt...."

[RKP5637]

10. I wonder if this ass has ever even been close to a gun fight/shooting/assault. Mental evaluations

are really needed, somehow, for politicians. ... but, as usual, who does that, who decides, that's a rat hole too.

[IrishEyes]

11. Okay

Since every home has a fire extinguisher then the gun people don't need guns in their homes. They can just use a fire extinguisher. Most shootings in the home kill family members instead of intruders.

This guy is a moron.

[jmowreader]

12. Okay...

To spray a mass shooter with a fire extinguisher you must:

1) Run up to 100 feet to grab the fire extinguisher without the shooter killing you.
2) Break the glass without the shooter killing you.
3) Arm the extinguisher without getting shot.
4) Run back to within range of the shooter without getting shot

And, most important...

5) Spray the shooter without him firing into the stream of agent.

If we were talking about a 2” fire hose with 1000gpm water pressure coming out of it, maybe. This fire extinguisher plan seems designed to get more people killed.

[FSogol]

16. When you say it like that....

[Igel]

22. Okay.

One, not every teacher could get one.

Two, some classroom doors are necessarily within a few feet of a fire extinguisher.

Three, you go into the hall to round up stray kids and get them to safety. Typically, a school has more than one short hall. The shooter can't shoot around corners.

Where do you go next? Back into your room which is where the rules and wisdom say you're supposed to run. Then you wait for the guy to come through the door.

During this time, you can be waiting with the thing. When he comes through the door, maybe he's firing and the fire extinguisher will accomplish nothing. In which case you die. But the alternative is you die without trying to do anything. And if you manage to disorient him, get him to fire wild, perhaps you can get by with just 5 kids killed instead of 20. Or maybe 5 kids wounded instead of 20 killed.

Not a perfect idea, but given the lack of ways teachers have to defend themselves, not a horrible one.

[jmowreader]

23. If you want to use an extinguisher on a mass shooter...

Throw it at him!

One of two things will happen if you do this.

The first is that you hit the guy and damage him, which gives you time to tackle him.

Or he jumps out of the way and needs time to recover. While he’s getting back to shooting, you can get people to safety. Get everyone involved to throw things at him. Throw calculus books at him. Copies of Atlas Shrugged. Chairs. Anything big and heavy.

Either way, it’s got to be better than what that guy was suggesting.

[groundloop]

13. Maine has some pretty fucked up GOPers.

Damn I hope we can win that election.

[niyad]

14. I REALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLY want to see him disarm an active shooter with an assault weapon

(okay, an actor using blanks) using that fire extinguisher.

[Maine-i-acs]

17. kiss that nomination goodbye, Shawn.

R's will not embrace someone unless they are all guns, all the time.
So they will push forward a worse candidate (I like this R actually).

[ManiacJoe]

24. Not a horrible idea if ...

... that is all you have available to use as a weapon.

If you have gotten to the point where fighting back is your best option for survival, many objects can be makeshift weapons. Of course, actual weapons would be best, but those will be few and far between if at all available.

[Scruffy1]

25. Just plain stupid.

Back when I was young I often worked at a race track. We had dozens of purple K 40lb bottles. The rule was it took two people. One to carry it and one to use it. By the time you carried ti fifty yards on the run you needed someone else to use it. I remember a famous driver we used up over 40 bottles to extract them from their car. Potassium carbonate is not exactly going to stop anyone and the bottle is too awkward for a club. If you try to run with it swinging from your arm it will hit you in the back of the leg and you will fall. You have to carry them cradled in both arms at your chest. Stupid, stupid, and more stupid.

[AdamGG]

27. Freshman year of college we got drunk and sprayed the hallway fire extinguishers at each other

It would be a challenge to stop a couple of guys coming to give you a wedgie, let alone someone firing a round a second from from a fvcking M16. This guy's apparently part of the Paul LePage intellectual wing of the Maine Republican party.

[LastLiberal in PalmSprings]

26. Here's a video showing how to weaponize a fire extinguisher.

What could go wrong? Well, let's start with the effective range...

[JDC]

30. Any excuse to avoid the real issue

Those folks would be dead in an instant. Didn't the Parkland guy have a gas mask and smoke grenades? Maybe thus guy can teach these folks how to use a damp sock as a smoke/face mask next so they can be fully prepared.

[LastLiberal in PalmSprings]

31. Personally, I think t-shirt cannons would be more effective than fire extinguishers.

After all, they're a proven technology:

[DeminPennswoods]

29. Did he get this idea

from last week's episode of "Young Sheldon"?