• Question: how Do I make a big explosion

    Asked by 323smap49 to Sheila, Piyush, Natalia, Gary, Dimitar on 3 Nov 2018.
    • Photo: Gary Munnelly

      Gary Munnelly answered on 3 Nov 2018:

      Ok, a big explosion is basically just a sudden massive release of energy. In fact, the only difference between a big explosion and a small one (as far as I’m aware) is how much energy gets released and how long it takes to release that energy.

      Randall Munroe (who is a ridiculously smart and funny engineer/physicist) once claimed that you could cause a nuclear explosion by throwing a baseball at 90% the speed of light. This would cause massive amounts of fusion to occur in the air molecules around the ball resulting in the sudden release of energy that is a nuclear bomb:

      https://what-if.xkcd.com/1/

      So I guess one solution is to get really, really, really, really good at baseball. Good luck! Don’t throw it anywhere near Meath.

Comments