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Holy Sh** Do NOT Throw a Water Bottle into Molten Steel

Because it will explode and rain fire down upon you.

The video above shows what happens when room temperature water meets a surface so hot that it explosively turns into steam. An instant after the water bottle hits the steel in the “ladle” that holds it, globs of molten metal ride a rush of expanding, super-heated air, producing a shower of sparks that would quickly turn you into what’s left of Viserys Targaryen.

SteelBlow_GIF

Notes below the video submitted by Gregory Kroll suggest that the water bottle thrower was probably fine (his employment maybe not so much). The bottle fell into a vat of molten steel that was already 10 to 20 feet below the camera, and the thrower likely retreated to a “bomb shelter” on the edge of the furnace deck. But make no mistake, this is definitely a “hold my beer” disaster waiting to happen. Who knows how many regulations he just broke.

The same reason why you shouldn’t throw a water bottle into 2500-degree Fahrenheit molten steel is why you shouldn’t pour water on a kitchen grease fire—the grease heats the water up so quickly that it expands like a bomb, throwing grease (and fire) into the air like a burger dragon.

The process also works in reverse. When The Backyard Scientist poured molten salt into a fish tank, it violently exploded as water in contact with the salt expanded to 1600 times its size in fractions of a second. Needless to say, don’t try anything in this post at home.

UPDATED: The GIF below, apparently from the same event, shows exactly why this is so dangerous.

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