Posted on 02/28/2025 7:15:34 AM PST by DallasBiff
I always get a little smile when I read these stories about someone finding a grenade and they send out the bomb squad, fire department, and police blocking the entire area before sending in an expert dressed up with a ton of protection.
Why the smile? I think back to the year as an infantryman in Vietnam where I had always had about six grenades hanging off my utility belt walking through the jungle and crossing rivers. I never gave them a moment of thought (until they were needed and they always worked).
FYI - for all those that have never tossed a grenade it is not like Hollywood. There is no big fiery explosion. It is a loud bang blowing debris into the air. The fragments can fly in a radius of up to 60 feet so you want to make sure you can toss it more then that (or be behind some protection). Last point, contrary to what you see in the movie you are not pulling the pin with your teeth, it takes a little effort to pull the pin.
The Convent of the Guns
Bradley T. Van Deusen, ROTC Cavalry
University of Chicago - The Daily Maroon
Oct 18, 1928
Our clean curved mouths are cold and dead.
Our polished skin is marred.
Our tawny thighs are thick with dirt,
Dinted, cut, and scarred;
Our day is done! But once!
Our open mouths blazed Deaths’ caress
Our tongues with steel were tipped!
Ah! Bitter spinsters were we then
As we slashed and cut and ripped;
Our youth was filled with lovers
All laughing, joyous boys
Who stroked our slim, proud beauty
Their latest, deadly toys.
Then clean and fresh and polished
We went forth with the Dead
The living, lovely happy lads
Whose last touch, dyed us red.
But supplanted like all harlots
By the newer fresher one
We turned to rest and quiet
As our kind have always done,
With a printed tag about our throats
To inform our lovers’ sons
We’re an Ordanance Exhibition
The Convent of the Guns!
El Tigre.
“”””Well, inert grenades wouldn’t be historically accurate!””””
That is why there is always a security guard at the Atomic Bomb museum.
I don't think so. The main charge is TNT, which doesn't dissolve or absorb water. The firing mechanism is sealed, and is ignited by a percussion cap when the safety grip is released.
A grenade must remain fully effective in all battlefield conditions; and, those can be pretty wet. Those babies will detonate under water.
The striker mechanism can be unscrewed from the grenade, at which time the TNT can be melted and poured out. The detonator can be drilled through and then submerged in water. If memory serves me, the cap can be unscrewed from the striker and the primer removed. That primer is just like a "large rifle primer". Tricky trick, that one.
Tnt quarter sticks primed with a blasting cap and time fuse will also go off under water. Used those for fishing in RVN.
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