https://phys.org/news/2019-10-arsonists-snack-foods.html
"Also, someone looking to start a fire who is carrying a can of petrol stands out. No one's going to look twice at someone with a bag of crisps, and the evidence destroys itself. This is especially helpful if someone is trying to make a deliberate fire look accidental. Criminals have presumably worked this out and told each other."
"Crisps encourage fire—they feed it—because they are hugely calorific and fatty. As the video shows, a packet of crisps—either the potato ones or the puffy, maize or corn-based ones—can set a car seat on fire within 200 seconds. Plenty of time for someone to get away."
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Investigators Report Arsonists Using Snack Foods to Start Fires
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(Score: -1, Spam) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 13 2019, @05:36PM (8 children)
The US is currently being invaded by Chinese troops smuggled in via cargo containers in long beach. Trump has sent in 10,000 marines. And this story is about burning potato chips?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 13 2019, @05:38PM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UW1zFRJM5yo [youtube.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 13 2019, @07:21PM (6 children)
Do you have a source for this about being invaded? I cant even find this info on a google search.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 13 2019, @07:25PM (2 children)
http://missourifreepress.com/2019/10/10/breaking-news-trump-takes-back-port-of-long-beach-from-the-communist-chinese/ [missourifreepress.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 13 2019, @09:10PM
That one wouldn't load for me. I suspect it's too dank. This one [iotwreport.com] worked.
(Score: 2) by driverless on Monday October 14 2019, @01:22AM
It's not very well done. The Onion does this much better.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 13 2019, @07:28PM
They were hiding in the MacBook Pro boxes.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 13 2019, @07:32PM
https://www.marines.mil/News/Messages/Messages-Display/Article/1979422/manpower-guidance-for-activation-and-deactivation-of-reserve-component-marines [marines.mil]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 14 2019, @08:17AM
https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/6721/muslim-invasion-europe [gatestoneinstitute.org]
(Score: 4, Funny) by Rosco P. Coltrane on Sunday October 13 2019, @06:21PM (5 children)
I start fires with broccoli. It takes a bit longer though...
(Score: 2) by RamiK on Sunday October 13 2019, @06:43PM (2 children)
Get yourself a still and cook some ethanol out of that broccoli. Will burn just fine.
compiling...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 13 2019, @10:52PM (1 child)
> Get yourself a still
Is that like recursion? Needs a fire to run the still, so you can make flammable liquid...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 14 2019, @12:33PM
I guess you can start it off some dry stalks or straws and use wood for fuel if you can't get it hot enough to for the oil to lit up.
(Score: 2) by driverless on Monday October 14 2019, @01:25AM (1 child)
It's a pretty dumb story, I mean, why crisps, and what's next? Arsonists start fires with newspapers? Arsonists start fires with synthetic-fibre clothing? Arsonists start fires with $random_burny_thing?
(Score: 2) by VLM on Monday October 14 2019, @12:09PM
Its a typical urbanist pessimist negative nancy topic. Kinda like the totally non controversial topic of firearms.
I suppose this is also very regional as there are some populated uncivilized desert states with eternal re occuring wildfire problems, but there are plenty of civilized "cold" northern watery environments where you gonna die if you get soaked at night unless you have a camp fire.
Nothing wrong with tossing a tiny "snack" pack of chips in your backpack when you go hiking, if you get stuck in the middle of nowhere (broken leg? twisted ankle? F-ed up back?) then you can have a nice campfire to survive the night or make smoke to signal for help. You're not "really hiking" unless you're outta range of cell phones. Which is kinda hard to find in 2019, but I digress.
There are alternative fire starters both commercial and homemade made of all kinds of crazy stuff like sawdust mixed with wax and cotton mixed with wax and the traditional birthday candle of course. OR those little metal canisters of matches.
I think this is well known among hikers? I mean, you can carry some weird homemade cotton ball and wax nonsense or pack some delicious and non-paleo and unhealthy, but tasty potatoe chips? I admit I eat the snack pack of chips when I get back to the car after a long hike (like more than 10 miles on improved trail, for example).
Weight matters for backpacking and a pretty big snack pack of chips is like 1 ounce.
I have a fire ring thingy in my back yard and I will say potatoe chips burn pretty freaking quickly, so don't try to ignite a 4 inch thick log with a chip LOL.
(Score: 4, Informative) by SemperOSS on Sunday October 13 2019, @07:09PM (1 child)
This reminds me of one of my birthdays where a friend of mine — who was working in a movie theatre — gave me a huge sackful of popcorn. My partner and I could only eat so much popcorn a day so they ended up slightly soggy after a few days and not a pleasure to eat. That was when I repurposed them as fuel for our wood-burning fireplace — nice smelling and easy burning fuel.
Mmmmmm!
I don't need a signature to draw attention to myself.
Maybe I should add a sarcasm warning now and again?
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Sunday October 13 2019, @10:14PM
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2, Touché) by RandomFactor on Sunday October 13 2019, @07:18PM
forty of the fattest pigs of the sort least good for eating.
В «Правде» нет известий, в «Известиях» нет правды
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 13 2019, @09:50PM (2 children)
I also heard that clowncels like potato chips. Ban snack foods!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 13 2019, @10:37PM (1 child)
You joke but the whole notion of a ban on objects is pointless. People with bad will are the problem.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 13 2019, @10:46PM
Ban people with bad will then. While at it, ban TMB too, even if he's not of the people species.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Coward, Anonymous on Sunday October 13 2019, @09:52PM (4 children)
Food has a surprisingly high energy content. For example, a Snickers bar has 220 Calories and weighs 47 g. That's 19.6 kJ/g, almost five times as much as the explosive TNT that has only 4.2 kJ/g.
(Score: 5, Informative) by c0lo on Sunday October 13 2019, @10:53PM
Salami rocket [metalab.at] is definitely a thing [wikipedia.org]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by ledow on Monday October 14 2019, @07:30AM
Yes, but it's not necessarily releasable.
That's one of the reasons that the human body is so amazing (along with many other animals). A Snickers bar can turn into a full day's heavy lifting for a 60kg self-regenerating beast.
Of course food has energy, that's why we eat it rather than, say, sawdust.
It's whether you have the facility to release it that's important - setting light to a Snickers isn't going to get you very far.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday October 14 2019, @01:44PM (1 child)
Poor comparison. TNT has to contain its own oxidizer (and remain stable enough to be usable as an explosive) rather than merely burn in air in order to explode. Remove the oxidizer part (remove the nitrogen and oxygen atoms attached to the TNT molecule to get toluene) and you'll have similar energy density, but it'll burn just like any liquid, high vapor pressure fuel would.
(Score: 2) by Coward, Anonymous on Monday October 14 2019, @10:31PM
The fact that there is a clear reason for the difference in energy content does not make it a "poor comparison".
It is a great comparison, because many people, even technically knowledgable ones, are surprised and surprise begets curiosity, which leads to learning.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 13 2019, @11:23PM (1 child)
Next thing you know, these 'arsonists' will cotton on to the fact that they could also use newspapers, books, clothing, furniture, plastic. The mind boggles. Slower burning 'fuse fuels' giving the arsonist time to get away is also a problem long since solved by 'arsonists'.
I'm not sure why the hype on this one.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 13 2019, @11:37PM
phys.org bullshit, again...
(Score: 1) by Frosty Piss on Monday October 14 2019, @12:30AM (1 child)
A burning cigarette tucked into a book of matches works very well as a time fuse.
(Score: 2) by Unixnut on Monday October 14 2019, @02:03PM
> A burning cigarette tucked into a book of matches works very well as a time fuse.
I heard that one before (and seen it in Hollywood movies), but does it work? I was under the impression that the filter end of the cigarette would not catch fire that easily if you just let it sit there. I have seen countless cigarettes left lit on ashtrays, and they always self extinguished at the filter end.
Or is the trick that you have to remove the filter end before you use a cigarette as a delay fuse?
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 14 2019, @12:37AM
speak *english* dagnabbit!
(Score: 1) by Sulla on Monday October 14 2019, @03:31AM
"Arsonists" makes a whole lot more sense than "Astronauts" like I first read it.
Ceterum censeo Sinae esse delendam