I HAD a 4 oz bottle of laboratory grade TNT. Dad got it back in the 70’s from a chemist friend. I found it after he died and for a short time thought about making a really awesome firecracker out of it. Then common sense kicked in and I turned it over to the police to dispose of it. Female dopers may not understand, but part of me really wanted to play with it.
Now to the question. How dangerous was the TNT? If I had packed it and detonated it how much damage could I have done?
About one eight billionth of a megaton.
Seeing how you didn’t mention a cap, you wouldn’t have been able to set it off anyway. One thing to note about TNT and other high explosives is that they are often toxic. I hope you washed your hands.
Rob
TNT.
Reminds me of the time we found an old mayonnaise jar full of water with a chunk of phosphorus in my dad’s basement. The lid was corroded so much we couldn’t even open it – eventually just broke it with a rock in the backyard. We had fun burning it up…
This was before the internet might have suggested more interesting things to do with it.
Not that there’s much chance anyone’s going to make that mistake more than once, but it wasn’t water. Water is not a suitable medium for storing phosphorus. It was undoubtedly oil. Do not store your phosphorus in water. Or, if you do, set up a camera a safe distance away so I’ll be able to see it on Youtube.
Were you thinking of potassium?
Actually I was thinking about a similar jar of sodium I found once and conflated the incidents, my mistake.
Holy shit!
From the article:
:eek:
I never had Smoking Stool Syndrome, but I once had an armchair catch fire. Does that count?
Reminded me of the old joke:* “Do you smoke after sex?” “I don’t know, I’ve never looked.”*
Does this mean we need a “smoke after crapping?” joke now?
OK, thanks for the best laugh I’ve had all week. 
Everything you need to know about TNT - search for “TM 9-1300-214”. Available for free downloads and viewing from a number of sites (I still can’t to the linky thing:mad:).
As for danger to yourself; 1/4 lb will cause you serious damage at about 7.5 feet distance. This is just blast. Any container fragments will be dangerous to a much longer distance.
TNT is toxic. Workers here get monitored (blood testing) on a regular basis. They get transferred out to a different job while there levels drop if overexposed. That’s with respirators, suits, and multiple filtering setups on the production lines.
Graciously said, after I’d been such a sniffy little fucker. There’s footage on YouTube somewhere of some barrels of US Surplus sodium being dumped in a lake. It looks about how you’d think. (It was already an alkali lake, which is just as well as it would sure have been alkaline after the event.) Enjoy.
More dicking around with alkali metals. 