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What happens to Ammo in a Fire? - A Well Produced Science-Based Presentation

jpm84092

jpm84092

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Salt Lake City, Utah, USA
Dear Fellow Second Amendment Lovers:

The anti-gun zealots try to use "community safety" as an excuse to create local ordinances that ban guns or ammunition. There is a "myth" out there that firefighters need to be terrified of citizens who own firearms and ammunition because if the house caught fire, the neighborhood would go up in a huge explosion. This myth is debunked in the video I have attached a link to. This video, endorsed by the Association of Fire Chiefs, records clear science-based evidence of the effect of fire on stored ammunition.

Please keep in mind that ammunition that is chambered in a firearm will "go off" in a fire and the projectile will have full ballistic force. This makes sense as the chamber directs the energy.

The video is a bit long, but worth the watching

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3SlOXowwC4c&feature=player_embedded

Yellow Cat Out-
 
anmut

anmut

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Stevens Point WI, ,
Awesome video - I had passed that on to some of my relatives last fall to show them that if a loaded .22lr gets accidentally raked into a fire that the world won't open up and dragons won't eat everyone.
 
Sorcice

Sorcice

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anmut said:
Awesome video - I had passed that on to some of my relatives last fall to show them that if a loaded .22lr gets accidentally raked into a fire that the world won't open up and dragons won't eat everyone.
Click to expand...

Lol!
 
OC for ME

OC for ME

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White Oak Plantation
Careful. It all depends on how the ammo is packed and stored. The military holds the same view as many regular folks, ammo ain't no big deal.....but, if things go just the right way. How about you reloaders out there.

Proper storage and segregation of ammunition and powder is important in a Murphy situation.
 
eye95

eye95

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Fairborn, Ohio, USA
When a cartridge is detonated inside a chamber, all of the energy of the explosion is focused against the frame of the gun and against the bullet. That energy is also directed on the bullet down the direction of the barrel for the entire time the bullet is in the barrel, continually increasing the energy of the bullet throughout its travel down the barrel.

When a cartridge is detonated with no chamber or any other container surrounding it, the energy is directed against the bullet only as long as it is still in the casing. Once the bullet and casing separate, the energy of the explosion dissipates in all directions, imparting a tiny fraction of the energy into the bullet. I wouldn't want to be close to that explosion, but an amazingly short distance from the explosion, energy levels, including the energy level of the bullet, will be tiny compared to the energy focused on a bullet coming from a chamber and a barrel.
 
B

bunnspecial

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Oct 12, 2012
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Kentucky
eye95 said:
When a cartridge is detonated inside a chamber, all of the energy of the explosion is focused against the frame of the gun and against the bullet. That energy is also directed on the bullet down the direction of the barrel for the entire time the bullet is in the barrel, continually increasing the energy of the bullet throughout its travel down the barrel.

When a cartridge is detonated with no chamber or any other container surrounding it, the energy is directed against the bullet only as long as it is still in the casing. Once the bullet and casing separate, the energy of the explosion dissipates in all directions, imparting a tiny fraction of the energy into the bullet. I wouldn't want to be close to that explosion, but an amazingly short distance from the explosion, energy levels, including the energy level of the bullet, will be tiny compared to the energy focused on a bullet coming from a chamber and a barrel.
Click to expand...

Smokeless powders don't explode, per se. They will give something resembling an explosion as long as they are confined(such as in a gun barrel behind a bullet), but at something close to atmospheric pressure they really just burn, and fairly slowly at that.

When a smokeless round is in a fire, the swelling brass(from not having a chamber to support it) will tend to keep the pressure down, and when the bullet pops everything will basically be under atmospheric pressure.

Thus, there really isn't even an explosion from ammunition popping out of a gun.
 
eye95

eye95

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Explosion is a continuum. Is there and accepted point along that spectrum between slow burn and the Big Bang that separates explosion from non-explosion? It doesn't matter. Whatever label you put on the chemical reaction that suddenly releases large amounts of energy, my point on the focus of that energy in a chamber and for a loose round still applies.


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