Early on 27 January 2013, 242 people were killed in a nightclub fire in southern Brazil (Santa Maria) after a band’s pyrotechnic show set the establishment ablaze. The survivors were confined inside the nightclub for an unknown period of time. A few hours later, Hospital Israelita Albert Einstein, a level-one hospital in São Paulo (Brazil), located 1,247 km (775 miles) from Santa Maria, managed...

PH O TO G RA PH B Y BR A D SW O N ET Z; IL LU ST RA TI O N B Y M AT T CO LL IN S During an early episode of the über-pyrotechnic television series MythBusters, Adam Savage was busted by the camera crew for misremembering his predictions of the probability of an axle being ripped out of a car, à la American Graffi ti. When confronted with the unmistakable video evidence of his error, Adam sardon...

Spacecraft are exposed to severe mechanical loads, i.e., shock during their journey orbit. Such loads usually develop due a separation event through the activation of pyrotechnic devices. They might be transmitted throughout entire structure and strongly influence service performance electronic components. Therefore, it is crucial study whether instruments can resist such harsh environment. How...

This article examines the early development of military rockets devised by the English inventor and Royal Society Fellow William Congreve in the first decade of the nineteenth century. Congreve’s efforts to imitate Indian war rockets used against the British in Mysore are set within a number of local and global contexts that saw increasing attempts by Europeans to imitate eastern pyrotechnics w...

Perchlorate salts of potassium and ammonium are the primary oxidants in pyrotechnic mixtures, yet insufficient information is available regarding the relationship between fireworks displays and the environmental occurrence of perchlorate. Here we document changes in perchlorate concentrations in surface water adjacent to a site of fireworks displays from 2004 to 2006. Preceding fireworks displa...