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Jonathan Grant Thompson, the man behind the popular science-focused YouTube channel King of Random has been charged with two counts of second-degree felony possession of an explosive device.
Thompson, 37, runs the King of Random YouTube channel, boasting about 200 videos and 8.9 million subscribers. His videos are of science experiments and are in the vein of science-based shows on networks such as the Discovery Channel.
Thompson has been making videos and putting them on YouTube since 2010. His videos have garnered more than 1.6 billion combined views.
According to the article the first complaint "resulted from a citizen complaint via Facebook Messenger on June 15 about Thompson exploding a dry ice bomb", and for the second:
Thompson said a friend had left him a bag of powder, which he believed to be from a deconstructed firework.
After lighting a couple of small "control fires" Thompson and Timothy Burgess, 20, of Ontario, Canada, ignited a larger pile which exploded, the police report states. According to the report, firefighters heard the explosion from the nearby fire station.
Google Maps shows there is a South Jordan fire station 0.2 miles from Thompson's home.
The explosion left Burgess with small particles of burned material embedded in his arms, charges say.
Burgess was charged with one count of second-degree felony possession of an explosive device. Court records show prosecutors have asked a judge to issue a $15,000 warrant for his arrest
Originally spotted via AvE's channel.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Grishnakh on Thursday January 18 2018, @11:15PM (2 children)
Its a projectile and a case full of a progressive burning solid. Not an explosive.
Actually, that's not true.
A "bullet" in the modern sense of a "cartridge" is 4 components:
- a casing, usually brass
- a projectile, usually lead, frequently with a copper jacket
- a powder that fills much of the space inside the casing not filled by the projectile; this powder as you say burns progressively, creating expanding gas which pushes the projectile
- something called a "primer", which is a device containing a high explosive that is ignited when the primer is compressed by the firing pin.
So yes, actually, a bullet is an explosive device, it contains HE (high explosive). There's not very much of it in there though, only enough to ignite the main powder charge.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 19 2018, @10:58AM (1 child)
Yes the primer of a cartridge contains a small amount of explosive material needed to set off the primary charge of deflagrating powder. A bullet is NOT an explosive device. To be an explosive, as opposite to say a deflagrant, the detonation velocity (that is the speed of the wave of detonation) through the solid material has to exceed the speed of sound in that material. That is the defining feature of an explosive. Gunpowder is a deflagrant. It can burn rapidly, sometimes so rapidly that it appears to explode, but it is not an explosive.
In addition, They aren't putting TATB or RDX in those primers, they are using comparatively (to other explosives) low power explosives. Something like the tried and true RDX has nearly double the explosion velocity and is 40% more dense (meaning you need less to get the same amount of bang). When it comes to the total amount of energy contained within that primer, Most guns wouldn't even be able to completely cycle their action.
On the topic of these idiots and their powder, Im wondering if it truly was an explosive. I've messed with smokeless gunpowder and black powder many times and if you have the right stuff it can deflagrate fast enough to produce a very loud report even when the explosion isn't contained. I can't think of any common explosives that actually explode when you light them either. Every modern explosive, whether its military use or industrial, is quite insensitive to heat and shock and requires the use of a detonator to actually get the reaction started. Im by no means a expert in pyrotechnics but im skeptical this was a true explosive. Are all forms of deflagrating powders illegal? Can you be charged with possession of an explosive device even if its just gunpowder? As I wrote that I realized that the law isn't as pedantic as I am and doesn't consider the explosion wavefront velocity. As I recall you can be charged with possessing a weapon of mass destruction if you have a pipebomb with enough black powder in it.
Either way those two morons should know better than to set off stuff like that without being in a more controlled environment than his goddamn backyard.
(Score: 2) by arcz on Friday January 19 2018, @09:18PM