Dropping Live Ammunition CAN Lead To Detonation
For those that have been wondering about the potential dangers of dropping live ammunition, we have a well documented example for you. The Family Shooting Academy had a recent incident in which a customer dropped a box of ammo. Upon hitting the floor, there was a loud bang and the box flew apart. Despite several people standing nearby, no one was injured.
Since the cartridge was not contained within the firearm’s chamber, the explosion targets the weaker, lighter casing. Typically, since the bullet is the heaviest component of the cartridge it doesn’t go far. In this incident, the casing ended up looking more like an expanded hollow point than the bullet. The owner of the shop explained that the customer had several loose rounds of ammo inside the factory ammo box, however, it was not a new factory box and there was no plastic sleeve inside the box. In the photo below, we can see the indentation made on the exploded cartridge. It appears that the rim of another cartridge struck the primer of the one that detonated.
The video below was posted on the Family Shooting Academy’s YouTube channel. The video was caught by surveillance footage and shows the event unfold in just a few seconds. The customer had grabbed his gun case and ammo off of a table when the box slipped out of his hand. The pesky thing we call gravity (which is usually a good thing), assisted the falling live ammunition to find its unintended target. All joking aside, the video clearly shows the customer felt horrible about the accident and none of my light-hearted tones should be taken as making fun of the customer.
The store’s owner said that he’s seen a LOT of dropped boxes of ammo and has never seen this happen. Thanks to the Family Shooting Academy for letting us share this rare but cautionary tale with great documentation. Have any of you had a similar experience with dropping live ammunition? Stay safe out there and protect those primers!
Doug has been a firearms enthusiast since age 16 after getting to shoot with a friend. Since then he's taken many others out to the range for their first time. He is a husband, father, grandfather, police officer, outdoorsman, artist and a student of history. Doug has been a TFB reader from the start and is happy to be a contributor of content. Doug can be reached at battleshipgrey61 AT gmail.com, or battleshipgrey61 on Instagram.
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As someone said earlier on, this is an explosion, not a detonation.
Propellant simply burns, the technical term, deflagrates. Deflagration/ burning is a thermal conductively-driven process, i.e. its heat transfer driven. The process travels at subsonic speed within the material.
Detonation is a shockwave (shock pressure) driven event. The initial shock, from a detonator for instance, causes decomposition of the explosive material. The decomposed components react together, releasing energy. This energy reinforces the shockwave which continues to propagate through the material until all of it is consumed. The shockwave travels at supersonic speed within the material, generally 16,000-32,000 fps for common high explosives. The pressure exerted by it is so high, often greater than 2,500 tons per square inch (five million PSI), that exceeds the material strength of most materials by an order of magnitude (10 times). This pressure causes the material the explosive is housed within to expand and fragment. These fragments are projected around the detonation point at speeds generally far faster than most rifle bullets, with speeds of 9,000 fps not uncommon.
In the case shown in the video, the case burst due to the pressure build-up of propellant burning within the case. The propellant was ignited by the igniferous output of the exploding (not detonating) primer. The primer functioned as something struck it, the imprint on it is clear to see. The burst pressure would have been higher than it would have been if you'd have just struck the primer in open air, as it looks like the round was confined between the floor and the object that struck it. This confinement would allow the pressure to build up to a higher level, not just that required to de-bullet the round.
Had a similar incident at work. A guy had some loose rounds of .45 ball in a pocket of his range bag. He dropped the bag from about knee height and a round popped off in the bag. We discovered where the bullet of one round had pressed up against the primer of the one that discharged and when the bag hit the ground the force caused the one round to strike the primer of the other round setting it off.