Quote:
Originally Posted by Skane
Without knowing further details, it could have been many things. Maybe in his panic, he brought the grenade back into the bay. Maybe he sneezed and pulled the pin wrongly. Maybe... well, you get the point.
What's important for now is that both only suffered minor injuries.
|
That is the good thing. Though I don't know what will happen to the recruit - I remember the protocol is that the poor kid will be charged for negligence with a dangerous weapon despite his moment of panic.
Still, it is better than being blown to pieces and having that mixed with your officer's remains.
Quote:
Originally Posted by JokerD
I suspect both of them froze for several seconds, given that the grenade exploded in mid air after throwing, if they dropped and climbed out of the bay I think it would have gotten both of them.
My story with explosives is that I once dropped a live M203 round while taking it out. Dropped onto the concrete floor then me and the sgt on duty looked at each other wondering what to do  In the end safety office came over, inspected for dents and told me to fire it off. |
When the pin is released, the grenade will be armed for 5 seconds before sending 300 ball bearings in all directions. If the grenade is dropped outside the bay, the officer will throw the recruit to the ground and drop on top of his body. If it is inside the bay, the officer will throw the recruit out of it then jump on top of him.
A HEDP round is different; it is only armed when 2 things occur : it is fired from the cartridge, and the imploder pin inside triggers the second detonation sequence; that is why it has a blind range of 10m-20m (it won't explode if it is fired within that range, but it is said to be as painful as a bottle being fired from a leafblower).
I had a even funnier experience with the M203 rounds - we repeatedly dragged entire belts of 30 from the ammo stash to the range to fire the automatic grenade launchers, because it is so heavy we simply chuck the entire belt at the weapon when we reached it. Later everyone involved in "throwing the belts" signed extras for careless handling of ammunition and we were told that each belt had 5 times more firepower than a single LAW rocket.
With that much explosive, that would make a pretty big hole at the range; and the process is a pretty macabre way to dig our own mass grave.