AirForce Airguns, renowned for their powerful sporting PCPs, introduced three new survival rifles in 2014: the Escape series. While Hollywood often paints survival with images of zombies and world-ending comets, real survival situations arise from natural disasters like earthquakes, fires, floods, tornados, tsunamis, blizzards, and hurricanes. These events require preparedness to survive until help arrives, typically at least three days.
The Role of a Survival Rifle
In real survival scenarios, you’re more likely to hunt deer, feral hogs, and other food animals than face predators like lions or bears. A reliable survival rifle can make the difference in obtaining food during such times.
Ton Jones and the Birth of the Escape Series
Ton Jones, star of the popular Auction Hunters TV show, highlighted the need for a survival airgun to AirForce owner John McCaslin. This conversation led to the creation of the Escape series, transforming the TalonP air pistol by adding a longer barrel for increased power, resulting in a true survival rifle.
Ton Jones aimed for maximum power from a smallbore survival rifle, and the Escape series delivers. The .25-caliber Escape, with a 24-inch Lothar Walther barrel, generates 97.88 foot-pounds of energy at the muzzle, achieving a 43.2-grain Eun Jin pellet velocity of 1010 f.p.s. Testing at AirForce’s Fort Worth facility confirmed both power and accuracy, with groups at 50 yards showing impressive consistency.
Three rifles
| There are three separate models in this series, the Escape, the Escape UL (for ultra light) and the EscapeSS, which is the version with baffles in the shroud to quiet the report. All three rifles come in both .22 and .25 calibers. Although they will accept AirForce barrels in other calibers, it isn’t recommended because of the interaction with the special Escape valve.
Ton wanted the most power possible from a smallbore air rifle and still be feasible to pump with a hand pump in the fi eld. The TalonP has a small 213cc air reservoir that makes it easier to fill from a hand pump. Of course, the shot count is less than with a larger reservoir, but Ton wasn’t looking for lots of shots. He only wanted one-shot kills with power and accuracy. And he got it. A .25-caliber Escape with a 24-inch Lothar Walther barrel will generate 97.88 foot-pounds of energy at the muzzle! That’s a 43.2-grain Eun Jin pellet moving out at 1010 f.p.s. That should be expected, though, because the TalonP pistol with just a 12-inch barrel already gets over 55 foot-pounds with the same pellet. He spent several days at the AirForce facility in Fort Worth testing the new survival rifle during development. Not only did he test the power but also the accuracy of the new gun. He’s so pleased with the Escape’s performance that he’s agreed to put his logo on the survival rifle. He says it’s light enough for anyone to carry all day and powerful enough to get the job done. |
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Expect some recoil
| The Escape puts out over 80 percent of the power of a .22 long rifle round. Shooting it is similar to shooting a rimfire. It recoils, and the discharge is similar to a rimfire, though more prolonged and not as sharp. Those familiar with the Condor will have to reassess what they know about air rifles when they shoot the Escape. It’s powerful, loud and built to get the job done, period. It’s not a backyard plinker. AirForce wanted to see what the penetration was like, so they built several wooden targets, but pellets from the Escape just destroyed them and kept on going.
I wanted to see what the Escape would do firsthand. I already knew it had smashing power, but could such a beast be accurate, too? Well, yes, it can! I shot several 50-yard, 5-shot groups with JSB Exact |
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Two more Escapes
The other two Escape rifles have shorter barrels, so their power is less than the Escape but still more than the Condor. The EscapeUL has an 18-inch barrel that’s also thinner to further reduce weight. The rifle weighs just 4.25 lbs. by itself; yet in .25 caliber, it outputs up to 79.46 foot-pounds of energy at the muzzle. It’s several inches shorter and several pounds lighter than a Condor, yet produces about 15 foot-pounds more muzzle energy.
The EscapeSS has a shrouded 12-inch barrel inside a long frame that’s filled with three high-tech plastic baffles. They’re a tight fit inside the frame of the gun, and a Belleville washer keeps tension on them so there’s no rattling sound.
While the EscapeSS has a reduced report, don’t think of it as the perfect backyard plinker for suburbia. Unless you also shoot .22 rimfire in your backyard, treat this little rifle like it belongs in the field! With a maximum power above 55 foot-pounds (the same as the TalonP pistol), the .25-caliber EscapeSS is a serious hunting airgun. Those baffles in the frame just take some of the edge off the report.
Speaking of calibers
I’ve reported only the performance of the .25-caliber rifl es. The .22 rifles are lower in power because the heaviest pellets in that caliber are much lighter than those in .25. The Escape in .22 shoots a 32.4-grain Eun Jin pellet at 971 f.p.s., for a muzzle energy of 67.85 foot-pounds. Expect the other two rifles to perform similarly.
Bottom line
These three air rifles are not for casual shooters. A Condor gives more flexibility, and a Talon SS is better suited to suburban shooting. These three are for shooters who want to get off the grid and avoid ammo shortages, high prices and every other civilized encumbrance. For those who want to just grab it and go, here are three affordable choices for serious airgun hunting.
Quick summary
| Rifle | Calibers | Weight | Length | Sale price |
| Escape | .22 & .25 | 5.30 lbs. | 34.5″ 39′ | $627.00 |
| EscapeSS | . 22 & .25 | 4.30 lbs. | 27.75″ 32.25′ | $617.50 |
| EscapeUL | .22 & .25 | 4.25 lbs. | 28.5″33′ | $579.50 |
