The world, many people say, is getting more dangerous. You can make it a little less so by knowing what to do if a terror attack happens to you!

From all over the world we read of mass-casualty terror attacks. Shootings in Paris; bombings in other parts of the world; shopping malls and train stations attacked; and even here at home we’ve had more than a few people lose their lives to terrorist activity, whether of the fanatical religious kind or simply home-grown nutcases.

A lot of concealed carriers (CCW, CHL, whatever your state calls them) seem to live with the fantasy that they’ll be able to stop a determined attack with their carry gun, and while that could happen it’s a lot more likely that you’ll be away from the center of the attack when it occurs. Knowing what to do, and having a plan beforehand, is likely to be more important to your survival than your shooting skills.

Oddly enough, most people I talk to — even hardcore defensive shooting students who have been to a lot of “tactical” training classes — don’t really seem to have given this much thought. Maybe because it’s not sexy or any fun to just sit and think, too many of us pass this by.

Luckily Marcus Wynne wrote a great article a few years back that’s really quite helpful for those who haven’t previously thought about such things. In it he talks about how to prepare yourself for a possible mass casualty terror attack in terms of training, mindset, and even some of the gear you can carry to help even your odds.

He recommends thinking ahead of time, doing some planning about what you’d do “if” something like this were to happen. He recommends having a framework in your mind so that you can make emergency response plans “on the fly” as you head out to a destination. Little things like having an emergency rally point can have a big impact in keeping the whole party safe.

He also gives some great tips about what to do during an incident and in the immediate aftermath of an attack. As he points out, your first responsibility is to yourself and your loved ones. Make sure your loved ones are safe before you do anything else, and don’t make yourself another casualty by running into an incident that you’re not equipped to handle.

(His specific point about getting down and behind something during a bombing is valid, but I’d suggest waiting more than a minute before exiting the area; a secondary device may be timed for two or three minutes, enough time for a lot of first responders to arrive and provide a larger pool of victims for another blast.)

He makes a good recommendation for some gear you should always have with you, and today I consider a trauma kit capable of dealing with severe bleeding to be an absolute must-have. (Of course you need training to go along with it!) A “blow-out” kit, as it’s called in the business, doesn’t have to be big or heavy but can mean the difference between life or death. Carry one and learn to use it. He includes some sources for quality gear, and I have no arguments with his choices.

Now, where to get that training? I’d strongly suggest you attend Caleb Causey’s Medicine X-EDC course at Safety Solutions Academy. Caleb is a superb instructor, probably one of the best in the business, and his Lone Star Medics training company has a superb reputation. Once you take that course there will be very little in the way of attack-caused trauma that you won’t be prepared to deal with.

Develop your mindset, get the training you need, carry the right gear. That’s how to deal with a mass-casualty attack!

-=[ Grant Cunningham ]=-