Reply to post: Re: Learning from Experience - flashes and bangs

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Re: Learning from Experience - flashes and bangs

Back in the late eighties, an associate gave me a device that looked like a large firecracker (TP or bog roll core sized) with a short tube and string taped to it. The official looking label stated "Ground Burst Simulator", but heck, it was only a firecracker.

After carrying it around in my briefcase for about two weeks, I finally got out to a firing range. "Hell yes, I wanna see it go off" the range master said. So I jerked the string as the instructions stated, and threw it about 50 feet. We ducked down behind a couple of concrete shooting benches until it started making a whistling noise. As we peeked over the concrete, the descending whistle stopped. Then it went off! We saw the shock wave! We also found a piece of gravel partly embedded in a railroad tie a dozen feet from the explosion.

I've seen flash-bangs set off, and they are dazzling, but I've never heard an explosion like the "Ground Burst Simulator." I later learned, from the aforementioned associate under threat of bodily harm, that it was supposed to simulate an artillery ground burst.

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