Seventeen-year-old Kimber Wood was home alone in rural Washington State when forced to use her father’s handgun to send a home invasion suspect running.

The day on which the incident occurred — July 3, 2017 — started like any other day, then quickly turned ominous.

Kimber’s boyfriend left the house to go to work and, in the course of driving out of the neighborhood, came across sheriff’s deputies who informed him that a manhunt was under way. A carjacker had crashed following a high-speed chase, and they feared he posed a danger to anyone at home in the area. The boyfriend immediately thought of Kimber and called to let her know what was happening. In turn, Kimber asked her father if she could keep his handgun with her in case the suspect came by. The father yes, and Kimber placed the revolver under her pillow.

Kimber spent a short time alone in the home before she began to hear noises. It was soon apparent that someone was entering the house, and she feared it was the carjacking suspect.

She grabbed the gun and took a position behind her vanity. The location offered concealment and would hopefully let her see the intruder before he saw her.

Seconds passed like minutes and suddenly — without warning — the suspect was standing right in front of Kimber, staring at her. She responded by shoving the gun into his face and screaming, “Get the &%#@ out of my house!” She said his eyes were wide open with surprise, and he took off running.

Kimber ran behind the fleeing suspect, firing a warning shot into the ground once she was outside the house. The suspect stole her boyfriend’s ATV and made his escape.

When asked if having the gun boasted her confidence, Kimber said she knew the gun gave her “the upper hand.” She said it gave her “a peace mind” that she was going to be safe.

When asked and how she was exposed to guns and shooting and why she was so confident with the revolver in her hand, she said, “From about the age of 6 or 7, I was always out in our backyard with my grandpa, my dad, my brother — our family — target practicing. I’d sit there and watch and learn how they prepared themselves and how they used the guns. When I got to the age where my father thought I could use one myself, I tried it and I knew it was something that I needed to keep learning about. I knew guns could be dangerous things, but if I knew how to use one, I would be okay. So, weekends we’d go out and shoot, come back and have lunch, then go back out and shoot some more.”

Clearly, all the shooting and practicing prepared Kimber for the moment of truth — a moment she handled with courage and a handgun.

An important post script to Kimber’s story was her father’s determination to be sure his daughter knew how to shoot. Lenny Wood said he taught his daughter what every father should be teaching his children. He said, “We shoot for fun and security, as well as for all the hunting we can fit in.”

When asked what he would say to leftists who discourage  gun ownership and actually claim that having a gun in the home makes the gun owner less safe, Lenny simply said, “At the end of the day, I get to hug my daughter — who’s alive and healthy and well — because of the firearm and the training she has had. And the other outcome is unthinkable.”