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Fireworks mishaps that happened to you

dpmuledpmule Member Posts: 6,645 ✭✭✭✭
edited July 2009 in General Discussion
I am probably like many others on here that have done things we should not have with fireworks of the store bought or various homemade versions, let's hear about some, I'll start with my last one a couple years ago.

Out back of the house, holding bottle rockets in my fingers and shooting them in various directions. wife wants to join the fun, but she uses a pop bottle, when the sparks hit her fingers she * toward me and I was approx 30 yds to her left looking away from her. The rocket shot, hit the brim of my cowboy hat, the back of my head and detonated in my shirt collar, stung like * and scorched some neck hairs otherwise no damages. You should have seen the look on her face, she wouldn't shoot anymore that weren't out of a staionary, secured launch tube.

Comments

  • Jacob2008Jacob2008 Member Posts: 19,528 ✭✭✭
    edited November -1
    My cousin accidentally kicked over an artillery tube which flew under my aunts deck and blew up under me.

    same cousin backed into me and put a lit punk in my eye on accident.

    needless to say, I no longer hang around him when on 4th of July.

    Another thing is the fireworks store guy told me what I COULD safely hold in my hand to shoot... I got a smoke bomb that was a large tube he showed me, I held it, lit it, two mins of smoke or so ... Well, it blew up in my hand. That was MY bad.
  • dan kellydan kelly Member Posts: 9,799
    edited November -1
    about the worst thing i can remember was setting one of our cats on fire when i was about 7 or 8.
    man, cats sure can run fast![B)]
    personally, i thought it was funny...my dad didn`t though...and he could hit hard with that belt of his[xx(]
  • 11b6r11b6r Member Posts: 16,588 ✭✭✭
    edited November -1
    Dad was a blasting contractor. Always taught me that the 4th was amateur night. [:p] Cherry Bombs lose their appeal when you have been working with 80% ditching dynamite all week!
  • bartobarto Member Posts: 4,734 ✭✭
    edited November -1
    We usta have roman candle wars when we were kids.
    My cousin,('ol baggypants), caught one in his back pocket.
    Prolly STILL got a scar on his *. lol
    [;)]barto[;)]
  • nunnnunn Forums Admins, Member, Moderator Posts: 35,988 ******
    edited November -1
    One very cold New Year's Eve many years ago, I had one of the old original Black Cat firecrackers go off in my hand. It felt like I had slammed my whole hand in a car door. OUCH!
  • p3skykingp3skyking Member Posts: 25,750
    edited November -1
    Just like real explosive ordnance, it only takes one moment of inattention to detail to wreck havoc upon yourself and others.
    Stay focused and never, ever smoke in powder rooms! [:D]

    Luck plays no part in not being blown up. [;)]
  • ATHOMSONATHOMSON Member Posts: 3,399 ✭✭
    edited November -1
    Neighbor kids sent a bottle rocket into my garage about ten years ago and started a small fire. Fortunately I was in the yard when it happened and put it out pretty quickly. It was an accident and I wasn't nearly as upset as their daddy was. I was starting to think he might kill those two boys.

    AT
  • ripley16ripley16 Member Posts: 4,834
    edited November -1
    Had a triple mortor go off in the tube instead of 200 feet in the air. Might have been put in upsidedown??? Much more attractive in the air than on the ground. Scared the crap out of me to be honest.
  • allen griggsallen griggs Member Posts: 35,183 ✭✭✭✭
    edited November -1
    When I was a Paramedic, we used to have fireworks battles.
    I would swing by a fireworks stand on one of my trips through Tennessee, and pick up a big stash of fireworks.
    The mainstay was the bottle rocket. I would buy 8 packages of these. Each man was issued a gross, 144 bottle rockets.
    We made bazooka tubes out of a 3 foot section of one inch iron pipe.
    You would light the rocket and drop it down the tube. You had a second or two to aim it, at 20 feet or less you had a pretty good chance of hitting the enemy, even on a head shot it really didn't hurt much.
    You had to wrap the pipe with newspaper and duct tape, otherwise, after firing a couple dozen bottle rockets in 10 minutes, the metal got so hot it would burn your hand.
    Also, each troop got a dozen Roman candles.

    That was fun, 4 men on each side, running around in a field, drinking Jack Daniels in the dark and shooting each other with bottle rockets.
    We mandated eye protection. Other than minor burns, the only danger was getting your eye put out. We would not allow somebody into the war if he didn't have eye goggles.

    We had had 3 or 4 wars, we would do them once a year, always had a lot of fun.
    One year I decided to spice things up. Besides all the bottle rockets and Roman candles, I bought a couple dozen three inch rockets.
    These were just like bottle rockets, but the powder charge was 3 inches long. A bottle rocket on steroids.
    Each troop was issued 3 of the big rockets.
    In the next battle, I was running around, in the smoke and noise of battle, and I saw Paramedic Billy, kneeling down 5 feet in front of me.
    He had a 3 inch rocket aimed right at my head.
    I saw the flash as the rocket ignited. The rocket hit me right between the eyes! I saw stars, the damn thing nearly knocked me out.
    I sustained a 1/2 inch cut on my forehead.
    In a minute, I knew something was wrong. My goggles were filling with blood.

    I had to call time out, get a bandaid for my cut and clean all the blood out of the goggles.
    After that, we outlawed the use of the 3 inch rockets.
  • claysclays Member Posts: 1,913 ✭✭✭✭
    edited November -1
    1960, Chatt, TN. Brother was 10 & I was 13. Cherry bombs and M-80s were a nickle a piece. Brother lit an M-80 and threw it, fuse burnt about 1/2 way and went out. He picked it up, relit the fuse and about the time he started to throw it, boom. Lost his right thumb & index finger. Funny how I think about that every 4th of July.
  • pogybatepogybate Member Posts: 3,150
    edited November -1
    When I was a kid a group of us rode around in a car throwing Cherry Bombs out the window. I threw one out of the back window but the fellow sitting in the back had closed it. Every body dove in the front seat, the thing went off, blew a hole in the back seat and we coundn't hear anything for a week. Never did that again.
  • steamingutpilesteamingutpile Member Posts: 65 ✭✭
    edited November -1
    I was at a Dead concert in what was then Rich stadium renamed Ralph Wilson stadium. I was in the upper deck when some yahoo shot one of those three inch bottle rockets from below me. Somehow it ended up coming up under my T shirt. I ended up with second and third degree burns on my chest and belly. Gotta be an idiot to launch things like that in a stadium full of people.
    Once I was launching those two stage outerspace lanes. You know the ones that look like a giant pill/capsule with wings. They're supposed to spin and fly straight up. Well this one didn't all the powder went off at once like an M80 on steroids. Everyone was hit with plastic debris fortunately only minor scratches.
  • Bubba Jr.Bubba Jr. Member Posts: 8,176 ✭✭✭✭
    edited November -1
    I saw my neighbor out shooting cherry bombs one day. As I went over to watch, he was putting one in the crotch of a tree about eye level. He lit it and we backed away. It didn't go off so he went over to relight it. Just as he reached out for it, it exploded. He turned around and looked at me and his face was all bloody. I went up to his house and told his mother, and she rushed him to the doctor's office. I went over to see him the next day and he told me he was blind in his right eye. There was so much damage to his eye, that he eventually had it removed and got a glass eye.

    I gained a lot of respect for fireworks that day, but it didn't stop me from doing some less than intelligent stunts myself.
  • nunnnunn Forums Admins, Member, Moderator Posts: 35,988 ******
    edited November -1
    Some friends and I got into a bottle rocket war with another group. We were on opposite sides of a small cove off North Lake. What got it started I never did learn, but we won. One of our rockets went into the open window of one of their cars and set fire to the carpet. They had to quit shooting to put the fire out.
  • COLTCOLT Member Posts: 12,637 ******
    edited November -1
    ...Only an old Black Cat Fire Cracker that went off in my hand, lit it, someone called my name and I looked away, BLAM!...felt like someone had taken a hammer and smacked my fingers.

    ...A bunch of friends and I used to have bottle rocket fights, hold them and chunk them at each other. I tossed one at a friend and it hit the ground then shot right at him and stuck under a strap that ran across the top of his shoe still spewing sparks [:D]...none of us, even him, knew he could tap dance [:D]

    ...A friend, Bubba, had his jeans pocket stuffed full of Black Cat's, well, he managed to light them...ran off slappin & hollerin' with his jeans exploding; blew up and burnt his pocket...and him [:D]

    ani-texas-flag-2.gif
  • grumpygygrumpygy Member Posts: 53,466
    edited November -1
    None that I did, like my fingers too much.

    But have been shot at with Bottle Rockets. Kind of scary when You are going down the road on a motorcycle.

    Had some Idiots use my 84 Comaro in 84 as a target. Asked them to stop they were drunk so you can guess their reply. Called the cops they said they were to busy. So I let them know I was headed out and considered them armed and so was I. Police got there real quick then.
  • elLOCOmuthaelLOCOmutha Member Posts: 54 ✭✭
    edited November -1
    When I was younger, I was playing outside with my cousins, one of them had made a rifle that he could shoot bottle rockets out of (just a metal pipe fastened to a piece of wood, it was so cool to me!) we were shooting bottle rockets at each other, (very stupid I know) well I had to time it and throw them at just the right time, I was holding them over my shoulder so I could get a good throw and the hot fuse was falling off unto my shirt without my knowledge. Well you know what happened next... my shirt burst into flames and I luckily stopped dropped and rolled. I didn't get seriously injured but it could of been bad very bad. After that we attacked a giant black and red ant hill in the woods and called a truce, we waged war on the ants instead. [:D]
  • evileye fleagalevileye fleagal Member Posts: 4,224 ✭✭✭
    edited November -1
    i had a ladyfinger go off an inch from my hand . burned real bad .just tossing them out lite an toss .but this fuse must have had gas on it . man it happend quick. my aunt put butter on the wound.that didnt help. why butter for a burn? well take it from me it aint silver dine.
  • e8gme8gm Member Posts: 1,277 ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited November -1
    Had a cousin that was 7 or 8. He was in the front yard lighting firecrackers and throwing them. His mom came out and told him not to hold them in his hand when lighting them. A little while later she hears her daughter screaming and crying. He let her hold the firecracker but didn't tell her to throw it.
  • n/an/a Member Posts: 168,427
    edited November -1
    I like to play with explosives. I have a few scars, but still have all my limbs and eyeballs.

    I doubt there is a year I don't get a good burn.


    Thats all I got to say about that. I will not inciminate myself. [:)]
  • indy_kidindy_kid Member Posts: 531 ✭✭✭✭
    edited November -1
    A friend and I were shooting model rockets, and decided to take the propellant out of one, put it on a flat rock and watch it burn. He was crouched down next to it with the match, I was leaning over it, hands on my knees.

    Only thing I see is this huge puff of white coming at me - fast. Next thing I know, I'm running across his yard with my hands over my eyes.

    Lost my eyelashes, eyebrows and my hairline was burnt back about an inch. He was about the same, but with powder burns under his fingernails with the fingers he used to light the stuff.

    His Mom called my Mom to come pick me up. No lecture. She knew I had learned my lesson and didn't want to add insult to injury. None of my friends made fun of us. They realized it could have been much worse, so didn't make a joke of it.

    Luckily, the heat pulse didn't do any permanent damage to my eyes. My vision was cloudy for a few days, until my corneas shed the outer layer of cells that had been cooked.

    Ammonium perchlorate. Same solid rocket fuel used in the space shuttle.
  • Don McManusDon McManus Member Posts: 23,458 ✭✭✭✭
    edited November -1
    A group of us fired 40 rockets out over a tent city peace demonstration in the Arts Quad at our college one evening. Little tree huggers came running out of their tents in all manner of dress.

    One of our group twisted his ankle badly as we ran laughing from the scene. Does that count as a fireworks mishap?
    Freedom and a submissive populace cannot co-exist.

    Brad Steele
  • xstuntmanxstuntman Member Posts: 678 ✭✭✭✭
    edited November -1
    Glue an elbow on pvc, hold it in one hand and use 'em to shoot bottle rockets at the neighbors who are shooting 'em at you too. Somewhere amongst the fun we forgot moms dire warning. We need a smiley with a bottle rocket sticking outta an eye[:D] X
  • FatstratFatstrat Member Posts: 9,147
    edited November -1
    I was about 16. A buddy and I borrowed his grandmother car and bought about $50. worth of fireworks. This was in the mid 1970's and $50. worth was several boxes full.
    On the way home start shooting bottle rockets out of the car window. Evidently spark landed in one of the boxes and all HELL broke loose inside the car. Rockets and flares were bouncing around and hitting us.
    Before my bud could get the car stopped, I bailed out. IMO at approx 40MPH. I was barefoot, and when my foot hit the pavement it turned it on side and sanded a good portion off. That was the worst of the MANY road rash injuries I had. Luckily no broken bones etc.
    That was it for swimming that summer. Couldn't because the water infected my wounds.
    My bud got the car stopped and bravely dragged the now on fire boxes of the few remaining fireworks out of the car. But the back seat was on fire and nearly all the interior had some type of burn damage. Altho his grandpa was TOTALLY PO'D, we were lucky he had Grandma w/a sense of humor who saved us from severe punishment.
    My only other memorable experience was lighting a Lady Finger stuck in fresh dog poop. It had a quick fuse and blew up before I got away. Had dog crap all over me and in my mouth.
  • john wjohn w Member Posts: 4,104
    edited November -1
    Leather coats and roman candle fights oh how i remember!. We did the same with bb guns but across a small pond. I dont know to this day how nobody got hurt!
  • Mr. PerfectMr. Perfect Member, Moderator Posts: 66,184 ******
    edited November -1
    Was lighting a mortar out on a dock and the dang thing kept tipping over, so to cure this I held the base with my hand as it went off. That seemed to cure the tipping over. A few "rounds" later the bottom blew off where I was holding it at the base. Burned the palm of my hand a bit.

    But that wasn't near as fun as when I was running an experiment at work ( I know, not fireworks related but still...). We were using an acetylene torch to heat a billet. The torch was in a pyrex tube so we could control some cooling air over the billet. Well, we modified the torch lighting procedure one time so that it was lit before the cooling gas was flowing. The acetylene gas backed up into the tube (which was about 2 1/4" dia by 6 in. long). Exploded in my face. Powderized the pyrex, sent me flying backwards and I couldn't hear for a couple hours. The team I was working with treated me to a round of beers and we took the rest of the day off.
    Some will die in hot pursuit
    And fiery auto crashes
    Some will die in hot pursuit
    While sifting through my ashes
    Some will fall in love with life
    And drink it from a fountain
    That is pouring like an avalanche
    Coming down the mountain
  • pickenuppickenup Member Posts: 22,844 ✭✭✭✭
    edited November -1
    Cherry bombs + wrist rockets + baseball field + (2) 2 man teams face each other @ 25 paces. [}:)]
  • owen219owen219 Member Posts: 3,799
    edited November -1
    Two years ago I had one of the very big rockets on a stick. set that sucker off and it circled around for about 200 yards then headed back to earth still at full force. It hit a car driving by and the sparks flew. The guy drove through the alley looking for the originator. No damage but that was my last one.
  • dongilldongill Member Posts: 2,640
    edited November -1
    A "hand grenade".....errrr sorta, did not go off. So I retrieved it and lighted it and the explosion split my pants and burned my arms severly.
  • KEVD18KEVD18 Member Posts: 15,037
    edited November -1
    ive had a few. aside from my own experience with teh tales told so far(bottle rocket tag etc), there was one memorable experience.

    fireworks of just about all shapes and sizes are illegal in ma, but for years this has been overlooked in a buddy of mines neighborhood. its a closed devolpment, one way in one way out type of deal. allt he neighbors are generally cool. well one year, a new arrival wasnt.

    so we're outside blowing stuff up and what not and, almost immediatley after lighting one of those square boxes with 25 little rockets in it, a cruiser comes around the corner. well wouldnt you know it, and i swear in all honesty this wasnt planned, one of the rocket went and caused to box to tip up on end. we were 20 feet away and couldnt have planned it if we tried. with this thing up on end, it was pointing right down the road at the cop car. it caught 4 or 5 direct hits and a whole lot of close misses. damn near poop myself. family connections kept us out of the klink, but it was a close one.
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