My friends and I almost got beaten with a baseball bat setting dry ice bombs off while in Japan, which just made Alan and me want to do it even more. Alan Throwing

The premise for a dry ice bomb is simple: dry ice sublimes in a closed container and when the pressure is sufficiently high, boom. We add warm water to speed up the whole process, but still pretty simple.

Safeway sells dry ice (as I understand it, you must be 18 or older to purchase it, but we did not get carded) at a rate of $0.99 per pound in up to 8-pound blocks. We got ourselves three pounds, and headed home, where we had plenty of bottles, gloves, a hammer, and a couple of airsoft guns waiting for us.

One of the advantages to living in the boonies is that you can set off these explosives and shoot BBs in your back yard. Although, the neighbors must have wondered what in the hell was going on.

In general, a lot of fun, and relatively safe. I’ve had some of these go off in my hands, and while there’s a bit of a sting, all your fingers are still there. As long as you’re not using a nalgene, other hard plastic, glass, or metal, it’s pretty benign. Shooting them is just an added bonus, and beats the hell out of setting out empty cans to hit. These targets explode.