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Explosions

Military specialists inspect a high-altitude ice field in the Dolomites, navigating treacherous terrain to disarm munitions left behind from World War I.

Cool Finds

Melting Ice in the Italian Dolomites Exposes Hundreds of World War I Munitions, Vestiges of the Vertiginous ‘White War’

Following low snowfall and record-breaking summer heat, the Italian Army is hunting for unexploded shells and bombs. “When they re-emerge, they are very, very dangerous,” one expert warns

A diagram of David Bushnell's Turtle submersible

America's 250th Anniversary

To Defeat the Royal Navy During the American Revolution, a Rebel Inventor Designed a Secret Weapon: a Bomb-Carrying Submarine

David Bushnell developed the “Turtle” submersible as a student at Yale University. The vessel’s attack on a British flagship failed, but the trailblazing boat’s legacy endures 250 years later

An illustration of a red giant star and a white dwarf orbiting each other in a recurrent nova explosion.

Rare Appearance of Two Novas at Once Illuminates the Southern Sky. Here’s How to Get a Chance to See It

The “new stars” are best seen from the Southern Hemisphere, but people have spotted them from the United States by looking near the southern horizon

An illustration of a nova similar to T Coronae Borealis shows a binary system of a white dwarf and a red giant orbiting each other.

Astronomers Are Watching for a Once-in-a-Lifetime Nova Explosion. When Will We See It?

A recurrent nova, known as the Blaze Star or T Coronae Borealis, is predicted to soon appear in the night sky. But the exact timing of the rare eruption remains unknown

A 2009 hydrothermal explosion at Biscuit Basin, similar to the one that happened this week.

Watch a Yellowstone Hot Spring Explode Into a Boiling Column of Mud, Water and Rock

Hydrothermal explosions typically occur every year in the popular national park, but rarely in areas so heavily trafficked by visitors

A wild boar in Bavaria, Germany. Levels of radioactive contamination in the animals have not declined significantly since the Chernobyl disaster of 1986.

Why Germany’s Wild Boars Are Radioactive

Fallout from nuclear tests conducted in the mid-20th century may contribute to the high levels of radiation seen in the animals today, a new study finds

Illustration of a black hole pulling in surrounding gas.

Astronomers Identify the Largest-Ever Cosmic Explosion

The burst is ten times brighter than any known exploding star and has lasted for more than three years

The federal government employs a total of 5,159 dogs, but only about 7 percent come from the United States.

U.S. Faces Bomb-Sniffing Dog Shortage

The pandemic has exacerbated an already short supply of specially-bred canines that detect explosives

Marine biologist Mike Barnette and wreck diver Jimmy Gadomski explore a large segment of the Challenger Space Shuttle, which exploded in 1986. 

Cool Finds

Divers Accidentally Find a Piece of the Challenger Space Shuttle

A documentary film crew stumbled across a section of the destroyed spacecraft that measures at least 15 by 15 feet

Exploding meteors, also called airbursts, happen with a chunk of space rock smashes into Earth's dense atmosphere. 

Boom Heard in Pittsburgh on New Year’s Day Was Likely an Exploding Meteor

The energy released during the blast is as powerful as 30 tons of TNT

An explosion seen off the Caspian Sea on July Fourth was attributed to a mud volcano eruption.

Azerbaijan Mud Volcano Erupts in Fiery Display

The flames towered an impressive 1,600 feet into the air

In the new reprocessed image, ionized oxygen is seen in blue and ionized hydrogen and nitrogen glow red.

NASA Reveals Spectacular New Hubble Telescope Image of the Veil Nebula

Advanced processing techniques brought out finer details of the nebula’s filaments and delicate threads of translucent ionized gas

To qualify for use in the study, videos of the explosion needed to have known locations and include a line of site to the warehouse.

New Research

Beirut Blast Was Among History’s Largest Accidental Explosions

The explosion, fueled by 2,750 tons of ammonium nitrate abandoned in Beirut’s port, wounded 6,000 people and killed about 200

Hayabusa2 deployed a camera to film the plume of regolith thrown up by the impact.

New Research

Japan’s Experiment to Calculate an Asteroid’s Age Was a Smashing Success

The spacecraft Hayabusa2 hurled a four-pound copper ball toward the asteroid’s surface at about 4,500 miles an hour to create an artificial crater

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New Research

Watch the Strongest Indoor Magnetic Field Blast Doors of Tokyo Lab Wide Open

The unexpectedly large 1,200 tesla boom could help researchers explore quantum physics and help in the quest for nuclear fusion

The activity at Halema'uma'u Crater on the Kilauea volcano has increased to include nearly continuous emission of ash with intermittent stronger pulses.

Huge Burst of Ash and ‘Vog’ from Kilauea Puts Hawaii on Red Alert

Experts worry that more violent eruptions could be in store

Using seal bombs to deter marine mammals is legal, though using them to round up target species is not.

Why California Fishermen Are Throwing Deafening “Seal Bombs” at Sea Lions

…and why no one is stopping them

Eight hundred pounds of dynamite exploding.

The Man Who Invented Nitroglycerin Was Horrified By Dynamite

Alfred Nobel–yes, that Nobel–commercialized it, but inventor Asciano Sobrero thought nitroglycerin was too destructive to be useful

The H.L. Hunley, a confederate Civil War era submarine, sits in its water tank at the Hunley Lab in North Charleston, SC.

One Scientist May Have Finally Figured Out the Mystery of Why a Civil War Submarine Sank

A Navy engineer used creative modeling and her knowledge of underwater explosions to tackle the century-old Hunley conundrum