A man who is dying from positional asphyxiation will not speak at a normal, conversational pace.
He will speak in short, repetitive statements that fade and trail off at the end, in an obvious rhythm matching their short breaths; they are unable to breathe deeply enough to construct a longer sentence.
Typically, they panic and start pleading, their voice cracks and changes pitch, display acute fear and become less coherent over time.
They may make nonsensical statements, begin asking for help from people who are not there, ask for their mother, and so on.
When sudden tranquility follows vigorous resistance, there is an extreme risk of death.
These things emerge consistently during positional asphyxiation, but they are often disregarded or not recognised by police and other workers.
This can happen despite education and training on the matter.
However, the signs are easy to identify once you’ve observed the pattern across multiple incidents in real time and heard it for yourself.
For training and education purposes, this video depicts several instances where men have died in custody after being restrained. Viewers will hopefully notice a pattern emerging in each instance.
On Tuesday 27th May 2025, 24YO Kumanjayi White was arrested after allegedly stealing food and assaulting a security guard who’d confronted him inside a supermarket in Alice Springs. He died in custody a short time later. What really happened, and who is at fault?
This is a compilation of a few instances where Australian police disarm offenders using open-hand or minimal and less-lethal methods.
A couple of other arrests were thrown in for entertainment purposes – highly ranked police who were interrupted and performed arrests during press conferences.
Handcuffing is hard, and real encounters are dynamic and unpredictable. So why is police training scripted and linear?
This video looks into what makes the process of handcuffing both distinct and similar to the challenges we face in martial arts, the problem with current models of training for police, and how we should be training our police instead.
Shocking vision has emerged of police trying to subdue a woman who was threatening drivers with a large knife in the middle of one of Australia’s busiest highways.
A 52-year-old woman will face court on Wednesday, charged over allegedly threatening drivers and causing traffic to come to a halt on the M1 Motorway near Taree.
At about 4pm on Tuesday (26 November 2024), emergency services were called to the motorway at Koorainghat following reports of a concern for welfare.
Police vehicles descended on the area with uniformed and plain clothes officers surrounding the woman in an attempt to subdue her and remove her from the roadway.
Officers attached to Manning/Great Lakes police district confronted the woman who was armed with the knife and threatening other drivers who were speeding by.
Police blocked the northbound lanes of the Pacific Highway and negotiated with the woman who allegedly threatened officers with the knife.
After calls for her to put the knife down and move away from the roadway, a taser was used to slow here progress toward officers as another can be seen tackling here from behind and pinning her to the ground in the middle of the motorway.
The knife was wrestled from her grasp as a group of police officers fought to subdue her and place her in restraints.
She was taken to Taree police station, where she was charged with attempt stalk/intimidate intend fear of harm (personal), common assault, possess or use a prohibited weapon without permit and use knife in public place – cause person to fear for safety.
The woman was refused bail to appear before Taree Local Court on Wednesday.
This is what real CQB looks like. People typically retreat as fast as possible after taking fire and fall over the others behind them, they don’t all push into the area the fire is coming from.
We tend to make a lot of assumptions about how people do or do not behave under stress, in a gun fight, after they are shot, and so on.
The “normative assumption” or “presumption of rationality” is the tendency to expect that other people will behave in a reasonable, logical, or rational manner in a given situation. This assumption often leads to misjudgments when others act in ways that are irrational and unpredictable.
This can result in poor tactical and strategic decisions.
You will never be able to understand what motivates some people, or the logic behind their behaviour, and that’s fine. Always leave part of your mind open to the possibility that things could go pear-shaped in an instant.
The gentleman in this video, for example, is completely irrational. You will not make sense of his behaviour. He will not respond to reasonable directions. He is not acting in his own best interest, he is not even responding to a gunshot wound to the chest the way you would expect.
There is a lot of debate around the difference between “sport” and “street” fighting, and what effect things like eye gouges, biting and knives have, particularly when it comes to ground fighting. Too much of the discussion is based on theories and assumptions.
I think the martial arts community can learn a lot from the infamous Ukraine knife fight video:
“Dirty” techniques work better from a dominant position, and will not reliably overcome your lack of skill and situational awareness.
The decision to take a fight to the ground is a tactical consideration and could happen by your choice, your opponent’s, or purely as a matter of circumstance / by accident.
All knives are lethal, but knife design is critical in combat.
Pain compliance is unreliable.
Control is paramount.
First, the idea you should never take a fight to the ground. This discussion is usually oversimplified and misunderstood.
You take the fight to the ground when it is tactically appropriate, and you do everything possible to keep off the ground when it is appropriate. Saying NEVER is a brain dead response. It depends on the situation.
Neither man seemed to have a plan of ending up on the ground. The Ukranian was forced to close the distance because it was the only option left when he was caught without his own firearm. There was nowhere to run.
For a moment, it worked – he disarmed the Russian and was able to force him down, before the Russian drew a knife.
In my opinion, the Ukrainian appears to have fixated on taking possession of the knife at this point, and conceded top position to get it.
Meanwhile, the Russian worked to take a controlling position on top. This was a critical moment in the ground component of the fight.
Many of us assume that if we end up on our back, “dirty” techniques like eye gouges should cause our opponent to react in pain and fall off. Or if we stab them, they will quit the fight or be injured/killed and unable to continue. And yes, this is a possible outcome.
Another possibility is that your opponent is determined to kill you, willing to fight through serious injury and pain, and has achieved a dominant position. Poking them in the eye or even stabbing them might not work without hitting a large artery.
Many have noted that the Russian bit the hands of the Ukrainian. This indeed happened several times.
A very important detail many have missed: almost every time the Russian would bite, it was in response to the Ukrainian reaching up to eye gouge him. However, the Russian was able to move his head and avoid most of the damage.
The reality is that just like strikes and submissions, “Dirty” techniques and weapons work better from dominant, controlling positions.
They stabbed each other. The attacked each other’s eyes. The (smaller) man fighting from a top position was able to do this more effectively.
Another point many have missed is that the Russian used biting not just to cause pain and injury, but for control: he held one hand in his teeth, which allowed him to use two hands to fight against the Ukrainian’s one.
He was also able to scan the environment and look for improvised weapons. He picked up three pieces of rubble, one being a shard of roof tile which was stabbed into the Ukrainian’s eye. Stuck on his back, the Ukrainian was unable to move his head to avoid this.
Knife design played a significant role. The knife lacked a pommel or guard, which would have greatly reduced the risk of hands sliding off each end of the knife. Both men lost control of the knife and were injured by the blade incidentally when their hands slid off at various times.
They also both grabbed at the blade intentionally which worked in terms of delaying attacks and fighting for control of the knife. One of the more stomach-churning aspects to watch, but they really did not have much choice.
Much has been made of the Ukrainian’s last words, asking the Russian if he could leave him to die peacefully. Personally, I don’t believe the Ukrainian gave up on survival.
I think it’s more likely that he understood he had lost the fight and was about to be stabbed a lot more, and his request to be left alone to die peacefully was a tactical decision more than anything; he was hoping that although severe, his injuries might be survivable at that point if the Russian stopped. His last words were “don’t do it” as the Russian placed a grenade under his vest.
Finally, pain compliance is unreliable, because it is not direct control. Compliance might be a secondary effect of pain, or it could cause more resistance. Control and position must be of highest priority in a fight.
In this instance, we see both men fighting through gunshot wounds, stab wounds, eye gouging, biting.
Both men were equally aggressive and willing to do anything to win the fight.
In the end, the fight was won by situational awareness, adaptability, improvisation, and positional control.
This is absolutely the most brutal – in the truest sense of the word – combat footage I have ever seen.
Watch this at your own discretion, and I recommend that you first read the short summary below to decide if you would still like to watch.
A second angle was also filmed by a drone:
A Ukranian solder, wearing a GoPro, approaches a structure and takes fire through a window. He was possibly hit, blood is visible.
He falls, returns fire, gets up and attempts to throw a grenade through the window.
The Russian soldier exits the building at the same time and approaches the corner where the Ukranian is standing. They both step around the corner and run into each other, clinch and fight over the Russian’s gun, before they end up on the ground.
They fight hand to hand with knives, teeth, and eye gouges. Both are drenched in blood.
The Ukranian is stuck on his back, while the Russian is able to cause more damage due to his dominant position on top of him.
Translation of the final moments below, from 6:40 in the video:
Ukrainian soldier: That’s it, mum, goodbye. Wait, let me die in peace. You’ve opened everything (meaning critical blood vessels) in me. Let me catch my breath. Very painful. *unclear*. Let me pass away in peace. Just don’t touch me. Let me die. Don’t touch me, let me die. Please go away. I want to pass away on my own. Thank you. You were the best fighter in the world. Goodbye. You were better.