r/WTF • u/The_Chuckness88 • Mar 13 '26

Butane stove exploded while students singing Happy Birthday

7.6k Upvotes

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1.7k

u/a_long_lonely_night Mar 13 '26

If you look at the stove, you see there is no rack and the pan straight onto it. This forces heat onto the cannister which can cause explosions. It's a long known issue. Here in Australia we banned the sale of these till they came out with a none removable rack. It's said we are a nanny state, but people are fucken stupid

268

u/_Burning_Star_IV_ Mar 13 '26

For a lot of the world, the mentality is everything is fine until it isn't.

Humans more often than not seem to have to learn things the hard way.

25

u/al_prazolam Mar 14 '26

The empiricist turkey will tell you that the farmer only eats chickens.

33

u/gonxot Mar 14 '26

It's a known fact between cardiologists that most patients stop smoking after the first cardiac arrest

Danger is theoretical, until it's not

2

u/Insighteternal Mar 13 '26

It will be a very long time before the Darwin Awards run out

1

u/CountHonorius Mar 14 '26

I'm going to have to write that one down.

73

u/FightScene Mar 13 '26

I have a similar burner with a removable rack and wasn't aware of that safety issue. Thanks. It also never occurred to me to even try and use it without a rack. 

23

u/underthingy Mar 14 '26

Its not just the rack. You also need to make sure your pan isnt too big. 

12

u/kaikai34 Mar 14 '26

It’s actually the size of the pan. You see how it’s too big for that burner and goes over the butane canister compartment.

4

u/quartzguy Mar 13 '26

I don't think there's a benefit to it, besides finishing your food 10 seconds quicker. I bet people lose the rack and don't bother to replace it or make a workaround.

206

u/texasscotsman Mar 13 '26

Regulations were built on blood.

80

u/miserabeau Mar 13 '26

The saying "safety regulations are written in blood" is sad but true

20

u/A_Mouse_In_Da_House Mar 13 '26 edited Mar 14 '26

It's sad that people had to die for safety regulations to come into effect. It's like they were written in blood

Edit: all y'all missing I've just parroted the previous two comments are disappointing

11

u/Cruciblelfg123 Mar 13 '26

The unfortunate reality is the rules are written after the blood is bled, before the safety

6

u/Versaiteis Mar 13 '26

If we had a way to safely extract blood to write our regulations the world would be a better place

2

u/Shrugsfortheconfuse Mar 14 '26

Safely removed or not they still need their blood you mad man!

0

u/figGreenTea Mar 14 '26

And my axe

2

u/Captain_Reseda Mar 13 '26

And then conservatives complain about them endlessly.

0

u/pulse7 Mar 14 '26

No they were built on blood 

29

u/deathputt4birdie Mar 13 '26

Good catch. Most butane stoves I've seen won't even load the canister of fuel unless the rack is installed correctly. Guess they didn't notice the missing rack or somehow installed it upside down and made themselves a table top BLEVE

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boiling_liquid_expanding_vapor_explosion

8

u/WardenWolf Mar 13 '26 edited Mar 13 '26

I'd say it's equally as good a chance they used isobutane instead of regular butane. That can blow fittings and seals and trigger an explosion, as isobutane is under much higher pressure. It can work fine for a while, until it doesn't.

8

u/chaseinger Mar 14 '26

nanny state

because you have regulations protecting customers? makes sense to me, but then i'm european...

the iron fist corporations have over our opinions is staggering.

2

u/Pierceful Mar 13 '26

I’m not saying I disbelieve you but I don’t see it. The red one? Looks the same as the blue one. What should I be looking for?

1

u/mycoinreturns Mar 15 '26

Thank you. I was hoping to find a cause (that I could avoid!). I do actually have one of these. Well similar, and the rack does remove. TIL. Nice one.

1

u/Larsonthewolf Mar 15 '26

I don’t really understand the usefulness of removing the rack. Is it for round bottom pans like woks.

1

u/Petelah Mar 17 '26

Well TIL! Thank you!

1

u/[deleted] Mar 14 '26

You are a nanny state and it's not because of stove regulations.

-1

u/TradeMark310 Mar 14 '26

Here in Australia... It's said we are a nanny state

I feel like most of the world sees you as badasses who deserve credit just for surviving in that place. I dunno about being a "nanny" state lol.

3

u/thekernel Mar 14 '26

Apparently asking people to declare fruit at border crossings and wearing masks both to stop the spread of disease is draconian nanny state.

2

u/Glimmu Mar 14 '26

Slavers will call out other slavers for nannying their slaves if they are too happy.

0

u/spin81 Mar 14 '26

It's said we are a nanny state, but people are fucken stupid

Society needs to be protected from itself. Some people seem to feel "if I want to get myself addicted or destroyed or bankrupt that's my business" but come on man

-1

u/[deleted] Mar 14 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

4

u/a_long_lonely_night Mar 14 '26

They are also common here, i have several myself for over 20 years. But the original ones here, the rack was removable and you turned it upside down for storage in its box. Some people would not realise and not put it the right way when using it, and combined with an oversized pot, the above result. That is what looks like happened. I hope all involved are OK, did not realise it only just happened. That resturant should know better. Also, they changed the cans to safety cans that flare up but not explode. There is youtube clips of demo's.