Awesome Explosions

After teasing us with a tiny bit of video of his explosive experiment with molten salt poured into water, The Backyard Scientist walks us through what he did to facilitate the destructive blast, and ultimately concludes that it’s strictly a thermal reaction, and not a chemical one.

If you’ve ever seen a big boulder sitting in the middle of the road when you’re driving in the mountains, you might wonder how they move them out of the way. Sometimes, the easiest method is to blow them up – shattering them into numerous smaller pieces.

To celebrate his 2 millionth YouTube subscriber, inventor, builder, and mad scientist Colin Furze created a giant turning wheel, loaded with rockets, placed precariously in front of cases full of more fireworks. The explosive end result is as bonkers as you’d imagine.

While the end result isn’t as neat as the smoking green pumpkins we’ve seen, loading up the orange holiday squash with dangerously volatile thermite is still quite a spectacle, and way cooler than smashing them.

The Royal Institution demonstrates a substance known as nitrogen triiodide, which is so highly unstable that merely touching it makes it explode. We’re not sure how they even managed to handle it to set up the experiment.

We’re not sure why you’d need to get rid of 2000 bullets, but this footage shows exactly what happens when you get set off all that ammo using fire. It starts and ends like a bag of popcorn in the microwave, but escalates dramatically in the middle.

To promote his latest Omaze charity fundraiser, Arnold Schwarzenegger posted Overkill – an epic supercut of all kinds of things getting blown up in dozens of his movies. True Lies might not have the most explosions, but it wins on quality.

A weird Japanese video in which they demonstrate how to turn vegetables into juice by setting off underwater explosions. The cool part is that the juice remains inside the veggies, as their innards are pulverized by the shockwave.

Video of Marines from the 3rd Marine Logistics Group, 9th Engineer Support Battalion showing how they breach a concrete wall, standing their ground against the explosive charge, protected only by a ballistic blanket and each other.

The King of Random is back with another fun, yet dangerous video, as he fills party balloons with extremely flammable, lighter-than-air HHO gas, lights them with a fuse, and sends them airborne. Suffice it to say, this is not FAA approved.

To celebrate his YouTube channel hitting 1 million subs, mad scientist Colin Furze set up a rig on the back of his truck loaded with firework, and ignited them at the same time for an epic pyro show. He probably should have worn his suit.

The ATF gathered up an illegal stash of fireworks, and worked with the police bomb squad in Midland, Texas to destroy the 20,000 pounds of explosives over the course of three days. Here’s a small sampling of the destruction.

While some of you got to witness some awesome New Year’s Eve fireworks displays, many of us stayed in for the night and missed out. Here’s our consolation prize – a supercut of some of the most memorable explosions in the history of film.

A demolition crew in Sevastopol planned to knock down an old 16-story building with explosives. Unfortunately, it didn’t quite go as planned, and the building refused to crumble. Their second attempt fizzled too. Third time’s a charm, though.

As part of a Chinese celebration, organizers set off an unfathomable number of firecrackers with a single fuse. And here we thought the kids playing with them in our alley made too much noise. Skip to 1:20.

Grant “The King of Random” Thompson demonstrates chemical reactions and an electrical hack which result in explosions, meltdowns and other chaos, and are sure to get you kicked out of science lab if you try them yourself. So don’t.

This already impressive Japanese fireworks display is distinguished by the launch of a massive 4-foot diameter, 1,014 pound firework, which explodes in all of its glory at about the 3:20 mark. That’s no firework, it’s a freaking bomb.

A steel mill worker watches as a batch of wet scrap metal is lowered into a melting furnace, which can be extremely dangerous. But he doesn’t seem to be in any rush to leave the room. Fortunately, he finally makes the right call.

While we were at the NHRA Winternationals drag races, driver Ron Capps encountered engine problems which caused a spectacular explosion of his Dodge Charger funny car. Incredibly, he sustained no injuries. Slow-mo footage at 1:30.

In celebration of the release of Battlefield 4, The Slow Mo Guys headed to an old military base and blew up some stuff, including the biggest explosion they’ve ever set off. Was it just us, or was Dan dangerously close to that one?

There’s no love lost for the late 1990s Chevrolet Cavalier convertible. So unless you have a soft spot for this ugly, anemic ride, you won’t be upset when the Slow Mo Guys blow one to smithereens – in glorious 2500fps slow motion.

We’re not exactly sure what sort of flammable cannisters were loaded onto this truck, but once it catches fire, there’s no stopping its explosive fury. By the time it’s all over, it lets out a whopping 39 big booms. (Thanks Digg!)

For his latest clip, Richard over at RatedRR lives out many a geek’s fantasy, by obliterating one of those pesky Minecraft Creepers with 30 pounds of real TNT. Unfortunately, one of his GoPros was a casualty, but the big boom was worth it.