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Other than the fireworks by the powders keg, the Billingtons seem pretty normal by today's standards.
Some of the worst wildfires in the US west over the last couple years were set off by idiots with fireworks FWIW.
And maybe a gender reveal one as well? Can’t remember but it seems likely true.
Multiple wildfires set by idiots with gender reveal explosives.
https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2018/11/27/us/arizona-gender-reveal-...
I'm still not sure what confuses me more - that "gender reveal parties" are a thing in the first place, or that they tend to involve highly flammable or explosive substances for some reason.
Wasn't there recently one case where someone filled a large balloon with hydrogen instead of helium, which then exploded indoors?
EDIT: via https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_reveal_party, so it really is a YouTube/TikTok challenge that got out of hand and is trying to become a thing...
EDIT 2: And to the surprise of no one, at least one manufacturer of high explosives is selling ready-made kits for those parties: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tannerite#Uses.
EDIT 3: The list of notable incidents is full of people killing themselves or their family members with IEDs, and it also contains a surprising high number of plane crashes. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_reveal_party#Incidents_... (and note it only covers examples from last 6 years). Honestly this feels like tales from some alternate bizarro reality.
Yeah, worst one is gender reveal pipe bomb that killed grandma.
Followed by the one that killed the father.
Yes, I'm sneering really hard at the whole idea, but at the same time, reading about some of those incidents made me cry. Becoming a father myself made me much more sensitive to stories involving suffering of children - including indirect harm, when e.g. a kid has to grow without one or both parents.
Replace "powders keg" with "propane tank" and the standards are met.
Good old terra nullius!