Explosive Cancellation MiniMyth | MythBusters

Is it possible to survive two explosions by standing directly between them? The MythBusters' answer may surprise you.
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[@jocax188723]

This is one of those ‘you get the feeling they know exactly how this works, but they just really wanted a very big boom?’ Moments.

[@thebirchwoodtree]

Well, they usually always know what's gonna happen, but this is TV, it would be boring if they were just showing numbers and talking about it

[@KingNichijou]

Lol no

[@jmckendry84]

Yeah, but the thing is (besides wanting to blow stuff up for TV) that until you actually do any experiment you don't know for sure.

[@wolfhors3_660]

@@jmckendry84 um yeah you do, at least this one. Common sense and you know the whole nuclear bomb thing. Opposing explosions to compress the core. Wish they had mentioned that but I guess it would have spoiled the show.

[@ethanwagner6418]

@@wolfhors3_660 common sense is not proof. That's why science tests even the simplest of questions.

[@greygoose3936]

If one car hits you at 50 Mph, you're dead. But if two cars hit you at the same time, they will cancel eachother

[@theenigma7290]

No you get crushed

[@Qui-9]

The Enigma, really..... Grey Goose wasn't being sarcastic at all... Smh

[@Ward1706]

If you jump at the exact right moment...

[@casadilla111]

Seems legit...

[@kilroy987]

They might not fail to!

[@ShardtheWolf]

The most impressive part of this test was how perfectly they timed the explosions. It's so cool seeing the detcord zip by.

[@osskeet]

ShardtheFox it’s not that hard.... you just get the same length code

[@bigsmall246]

The test was NOT perfectly timed. if you look closely, the shockwave speed was much higher than the det cord speed. This means even a 1mm difference in det cord length would have caused a great difference (maybe 10cm) in the spot where the explosive wave fronts meet.

[@Funkoh]

bigsmall246 even if it was the same, the result would have been the same only that the thing would go flying

[@nicksales3800]

It's shock-tube (Nonel) that you can see, not det-cord.

[@rhymereason3449]

That's the EASIEST part of the project.... anyone can measure out Det cord to the same length... nothing impressive about that at all.

[@kjgoebel7098]

Producers: People are saying that the shockwave from one explosion will cancel out the one from another explosion. Adam & Jamie: That's idiotic. That's not how waves work at all. Producers: You'd have to set off, say, three large explosions to test it... Adam & Jamie: WE'RE ON IT.

[@TGA_BAY_BAY]

kjgoebel I wouldn't doubt that.

[@Me1le]

Not very likely since Adam and Jamie were executive producers of the show from 2010 and onwards.

[@Cronocke]

I mean, that just makes it more likely. Replace "Producers" with "Adam" and "Adam and Jamie" with just "Jamie" and you get the same conversation.

[@HidekiShinichi]

well they are inteligent enought to understeand that its possible

[@adam_-adam]

kjgoebel this is how it works, if your in the middle your still fucked!! because any blast that creates a shock wave will mess your body up at close distance. if anything its not going to cancle each other out but instead mess you up more or kinda compress your body from it sqeezing your body

[@MrClickity]

"The MythBusters' answer may surprise you." Will it, though? Will it really?

[@jordan3012000]

MrClickity ikr

[@steveurquell3031]

It may

[@Jebu911]

Who the fuck thought that would cancel it somehow. You are just twice as dead you were before

[@GusCraft460]

Jebu911 it’s based on a well documented phenomenon known as destructive interference. So it’s not like this is completely unfounded. The problem is that destructive interference is only a half wavelength off from constructive interference which would double the strength the pressure wave instead of canceling it out. This is basic high school physics.

[@hotmojoe2483]

Jebu911 Who’s more dead? (reference to JonTron)

[@tejashpatel4981]

Has someone said “Two bombs don’t make a right” yet?

[@GreysUniverse]

Stand between two blast waves. How to become a pancake of blood and mush 😂

[@SmallSpoonBrigade]

Pretty much. This is what happens with pressure waves, when they're in phase they add, when they're 180 degrees out of phase they cancel. Arranging for them to hit each other completely out of phase would at least have the possibiltiy of canceling out rather than constructively interfering.

[@victorselve8349]

@@SmallSpoonBrigade the thing is no matter what phase to waves have to each other, they still propagate at a finite speed. So when you are standing between their sources you will still experience the initial wave passing you without interference once (or well if you are standing in the center you will experience it from different directions because there's 1 wave coming from the left and 1 from the right of course). You would need to have the 2 explosions in line with the second triggering exactly while the first passes and also manage to set of an implosion since the beginning of the wavefronts need to have a pi phase shift as well and the positive part of the wave for an explosion will always be larger than the negative portion

[@bluewater82]

My ERT supervisor would refer to it as “becoming a pink mist.”

[@kelli217]

Origins of this myth may have come from an old roadshow stunt. The gag consists of a stunt performer in a chair in the middle of a ring of equally-spaced sticks of dynamite. The dynamite is set off, and the performer is obscured by the cloud of the explosions, which is played up by the barker as being ominous, but then the performer is soon shown to have escaped completely unharmed.

[@superluckykc2449]

Yep, Dennis Hopper did it in Houston in 1983 kzbin.info/www/bejne/eJfIZJJ8ftp4ha8 The explosion didn't look very big, and was definitely "played up."

[@trikstari7687]

@@superluckykc2449 OH THANK GOD I'M NOT THE ONLY ONE WHO REMEMBERED HEARING ABOUT THAT.

[@pobvic]

​@@LWLProductionsflashy, low power explosives. Lots of smoke and noise, very little overpressure

[@ATruckCampbell]

@@LWLProductions Black powder most likely.

[@Psiberzerker]

One problem with this hypothesis is that surface ripples are transverse waves, while explosive shock is a compression wave. The 2 types of waves act differently, basically at right angles to each other.

[@Backwoods_Adventures]

Dude hush.

[@ozmiumYT]

I believe longitudinal waves can still interfere with each other constructively/destructively. I think the logic behind the hypothesis is that since the direction of travel of the waves are opposite to one another, their "forces" would "cancel" each other out. The problem is that pressure depends on the magnitude of the forces, which don't really cancel out. That being said I wonder how this situation would be expressed via Cauchy stress tensors.

[@WaterCrane]

I'd be more concerned with getting hit by shrapnel from both sides! So it looks like I'll be crushed and skewered doubly so!

[@breadbutt]

even *IF* the explosions were able to cancel each other out, you'd still have the problem that your body is only at the center of the two explosions at a singular point. the rest of your body is going to feel the full impact of each explosion on either side. Not to mention shrapnel. But yeah, the bottom line is that you don't cancel out a compression wave by starting another at the same time. You have to create them at exactly one wavelength apart, with the same frequency and amplitude.

[@markmd9]

You can not cancel explosions at all! Because they are not like sound or water waves. They produce one hypersonic positive peak followed by a subsonic negative phase. Which can't overlap.

[@MichaelClark-uw7ex]

The peak of one wave would have to hit the trough of the other wave. But compression waves don't work that way It would be like being at the collision point of 2 cars colliding.

[@Sethgolas]

The precise doubling of pressure in practice shows really great experimental precision. That's pretty awesome work!

[@StandardAI]

If two people took a crap on you at opposite directions would it still make a smell or would the smells cancel each other out?

[@freedapeeple4049]

I dunno about that one, but if you burp and fart at the same time, you turn inside out

[@trevscribbles]

If you hold a naked flame to your open-mouth while simultaneously farting on a mirror, you will breathe fire!

[@yuhyuh7603]

It would cause an explosion.

[@aleksandarstevanovic5854]

Well you could think the other way, put two pianos in a room, play the same note at the same time, and if you are standing in the middle by this myth theory you wouldn't hear a thing... But quite the opposite, you'll hear twice as loud... You don't have to be a badass physicist to understand that :-)

[@theviewer6889]

I think they just wanted to blow stuff up.

[@o3941]

You may want to watch one of the videos on the General Electric channel. Specifically, the "You can't unring a bell". You may be surprised by what happens.

[@NeverMakingVideos]

Well that's not entirely true. Due to the nature of waves, you can have either constructive interference (adding together) when waves are in phase or destructive interference (cancelling out) when they're perfectly out of phase. For the 2 explosions shown above, I can't imagine they'll ever find a point where the shockwaves will cancel out, as they're the wavefronts. It could be different for following intersections of them though. However, with the readings taken exactly in the middle, the waves will almost always be in phase with one another, so you'll get the doubling they got. And for your piano example, that can happen, just not when you're in the middle. A friend of mine is a sound engineer and he's worked with people who had no proper training who set up sound systems in such a way that there were dead zones in the room - not fully quiet, but noticeably.

[@justinc2633]

Alek this is kind of ironic because u clearly dont know a lot about physics going by ur comment

[@Kinorian1212]

Actually... Yes this is possible. In this video there was constructive interference, but in sound there can be destructive interference. The idea of a “standing wave” is 2 waves at the same frequency and volume that are perfectly synced to cancel each other out, producing no sound. (I’m a year late but hell why not)

[@j-swizzle1922]

That has to be the worst theory ever. I wouldn’t ever have thought they would’ve cancelled each other..... but I still had to watch just to confirm lol

[@charadremur333]

But science can be counterintuitive sometimes.

[@JonatasAdoM]

Watched it for big boom; and their reactions.

[@ivanalvarez5511]

@@charadremur333 yup, just look at how noise cancelling headphones work

[@Looppehh]

So the reason this doesn't work is the reason why active noise cancellation does. Active noise cancellation creates a negative wave in comparison to the sound, so just the opposite amplitude of the soundwave. The two explosions do not cancel each other out, but instead double the pressure since they have the same shockwave. In theory you can cancel out the Shockwave with a negative Shockwave of similar proportion.

[@shaungiesbrecht4697]

So they need to set off an explosion and an implosion simultaneously

[@markmd9]

Just one problem. Negative shockwaves can't exist.

[@asahamada6403]

The results make total sense though 💀 you have to waves crashing into one another, it's gonna be violent. The only "wave canceling" I've ever heard of is two sound waves being played against one another while one was the inverse of the other

[@captainsinclair7954]

Another thing to point out is that doubling the bombs also means doubling the shrapnel. Even if the PSI dropped, you’d still be deaf and shredded.

[@CodeZeeZ]

The only way to cancel each other out would be to have a bomb that made negative wave explosion. Aka not possible.

[@shermanthompson871]

CodeZeeZ or 180 degrees out of phase, which is possible.

[@dreed100]

Implosion?

[@strangelee4400]

Get back...he has a bmob!

[@MrDuno9]

Yeah you could do it, I imagine you'd either want to change the timing or the distance between the bombs such that the rarefaction of the first shockwave intersects with the compression of the second shock wave at a specific point. So, 180 degrees out of phase like another comment said. But, I imagine the space where they intersect would be so small that you'd still be very much dead from the other points where the waves are not cancelled out.

[@bigsmall246]

@@shermanthompson871 but in practice, the negative pulse (immediately after the main positive pulse) is much smaller. So they won't completely cancel out (maybe 50% cancelled out at most)

[@LordBlob1]

No shit it would double the power. The two waves would just superpose creating constructive interference for an even bigger force.

[@zilvoxidgod]

Dude... The waves hit you before they hit each other

[@tHustr4]

How was this even a question? it's like saying that being crushed between two walls would do less damage than running into a single one.

[@kinggoldcatter9932]

They probably jest wanted an excuse to blow stuff up

[@TalkingHands308]

Probably flat-earthers who thought it would be true because of their flawed understanding of physics...

[@dustinjames1268]

Seems you dont know how it works either When shockwaves meet out of phase, they DO cancel out. Because these explosions were simultaneous, they met in phase, and combined. Thats just how waves work. You're the dumb one

[@Kasum_ish]

@@dustinjames1268 But wouldn't the myth be busted anyway? Since the pressure waves of an explosion push air outwards first, the leading edge of the shockwave will always have positive pressure, so regardless of where you stand you will always be hit by a positive pressure wave first before they can get cancelled out.

[@dustinjames1268]

@@Kasum_ish The myth isn't necessarily saying that explosions can be entirely canceled out Its right in the sense that you can diminish the effects in certain locations where the waves overlap But you have a point that there will still always be points where the explosion is at full power

[@mossystoneproductions905]

I love how when they're setting them off, both Adam and Jamie flinch but the old man doesn't move a muscle

[@ralphyetmore]

A bomb expert's strength only grows with each explosion.

[@moldyskittle]

This is like thinking jumping before a falling elevator impacts with the ground will save your life.

[@JonatasAdoM]

They have tested that one too

[@aaronkeith2644]

So it was like a car hitting a wall for the first, then two cars colliding

[@WM_46]

Actually, wrong. The mythbusters did a test exactly like this, they assumed that two trucks at 45 mph colliding would be like one hitting a wall at 90 mph. After testing, it turned out to not be that way

[@GoblinKnightLeo]

This was my prediction. Unless the frequencies were somehow literal inverses, there was no chance of it being anything else. Waves don't normally interfere with one another.

[@VRMusic]

Reactive armor, usually used on side of tanks, do contain explosives to counter the effects of explosive ordnants.

[@VulpisFoxfire]

Yep, but a) they're directional shaped charges radiating away from the tank hull, and b) the meeting point between the incoming explosion and the reactive one is going to have double the pressure, as shown.

[@Jmandude5]

Who would have thought that doubling the amount of tnt would double the pressure wave? Oh right, anyone with 2 brain cells to rub together.

[@benjaminhackett8896]

Perfect demonstration of constructive interference. The only area where two blast waves could possibly cancel out (destructively interfere) is where the leading edge of one shockwave is just behind the leading edge of the other, after the two have intersected. However, one leading edge will always hit you first, and the area of cancellation is likely so small that even ignoring the initial blast from the first shockwave to hit you, only a tiny sliver (or two) of your body will be within the cancellation zone. Think about a shockwave from a blast like one single wave of sound. If you are exactly in the middle of the blasts, then a shockwave will enter each arm, they will intersect (and constructively interfere) at your vertical middle, cancel out just on either side of your middle, and then continue to the opposite arms. Since shockwaves are round, your head, middle, and legs will receive the shockwave at very slightly different times. All this happens happens faster than the speed of sound, and the varying pressures will likely rip your body to shreds even more than one constant pressure. If on the other hand, you stand to one side of between the two blasts, with the edge of one arm just almost touching the center line, you won't have to worry about any part of your body being within the constructive interference zone. However, when the blasts go off, the shockwave nearest you will enter the arm pointing away from the center line, travel through the body, and constructively interfere with the other shockwave just after exiting the other arm. The other shockwave will enter your arm, at this point cancelling out with the first shockwave. Just after entering that arm, as it continues to travel the second shockwave will no longer cancel out with the first and will continue through the body to exit the opposite arm. In this case you get hit by one shockwave first, immediately followed by a second from the opposite side, and the skin on one arm (maybe the muscle too) will not have felt the blast. Congratulations. You're probably still dead though. Of course all of this assumes in practicality that you somehow won't get hit by shrapnel and that you just happen to be standing in the right spot in the extremely unlikely event of a simultaneous double explosion. If both of those things occur, you're still dead.

[@geoffgreen2105]

In Shadowrun we called this the Chunky Salsa Effect.

[@Chimera6297]

Jamie looks like a fuckin badass movie character with those sunglasses

[@yz25]

who would've thought that two explosives detonated next to each other would be stronger than one

[@razibbaf]

It's about the pressure waves. Same power wave meeting exactly in the middle will double power due to coherence. In other words, constructive interference adds local amplitudes of all contributing waves. As simple as it is. Video is nicely done. I suggest scientific illustration at the end would compete the video for the target audiences.

[@erinleafty6273]

Youd also want to take into consideration a scary thing called shrapnel which will get you if the shockwave doesn't

[@crome212]

👏😩 very beautiful scientific explanation

[@theshuman100]

so what youre saying is, we need to offset the bomb by the width of the shockwave in order for the bombs to cancel out

[@dougaltolan3017]

​@@theshuman100that cannot work.... You would need a rarefaction (opposite of compression) equal to the pressure wave. That requires less than zero pressure (absolute), which isn't a thing since vaccum is as low, as you can go. Explosions produce supersonic shock waves, which means there is no possible cancelling.

[@jacobburlaga8358]

Just been covering the science behind this in A level physics, great to see a real life demonstration!!

[@Meteo_sauce]

superposition right?

[@jacobburlaga8358]

@@Meteo_sauce yep!

[@chriskalantzis7429]

That’s a nice lake. I wish I could go fishing there

[@addysidhu5669]

Standing between two brick walls coming towards you, even if you forget about shrapnel’s

[@BenRusk11]

i think the most impressive feat was that old guy in the back just poker facing each blast that rattled the whole set.

[@OlOleander]

In practice, unfortunately, since most human bodies aren't single points, it just means you'll catch two shocks on either side of your body.

[@mickblock]

EXCACTLY. Of course the pressure sensors aren't single points either.

[@OlOleander]

Michael Block True.

[@sucknorrisatchuckboris2713]

You theory nuts won't stop will you!? Even a single point would make no difference since the point will experience both explosions at the same time with *TWO* pressure points.

[@OlOleander]

Suck Norris at Chuck Boris Bruh no shit. The point was that even if the theory proved true with a point, it wouldn't work on a solid body. Jiminy. Put some ice in your drink and chill.

[@BjaFos1]

This is pressurewaves which "moves" the air parallel to the direction of the wave, therefore the pressure doubles. On the other hand, if they had recorded the shear waves (in the rig), they should cancel out because the particle movement is orthogonal to the direction of the wave. Here the superposition principle would be valid and the shear waves, in theory, should cancel each other out.

[@BASavage81]

Just like Jamie and Adam knew before hand, the results were to be expected. I liked these kinds of episodes for two reasons. 1st, explosions are cool. 2nd, it shows how that the devil is in the details. In short the people who sent the "myth" don't have enough education or practical experience to know that physical science is much different that false logic.

[@DaGn0528]

Is it just me, or is this the highest quality video ever uploaded to KZbin?! Someone's got to leak the video compression settings they used

[@Walrus102]

that's obvious. Two waves at the same frequency will ad to make one larger magnitude.

[@andressedillo2023]

as much as I love myth busters, this isn't a myth. this is the principal that reactive armor on tanks works on. the pressure and shockwave of a heat shell impact is countered by a layer of explosives on the surface of the armor

[@007Kellam]

a bomb explosion isnt a wave, which is why it doubles instead of canceling. It just produces gas so rapidly it pressurises the air around it. adding a second would just make the pressure double.

[@vxcvbzn]

The explosion is not. The shockwave is. We were looking at the shockwave. It did not work because they should be offset by 180 degrees in phase.

[@vxcvbzn]

The shockwave is nothing more that a exteme pressure change

[@makdavian3567]

vxcvbzn Exactly what I was thinking. If it went up at 4, it might have gone down at some other intersection.

[@stacko1669]

007K and

[@stefanstrub4481]

It is a wave en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P-wave It was just konstruktive interverenz. Thats why it doubles.

[@alphamineron]

Oh My God! These episodes just make me question humans! How dumb is that? Why would they cancel out? How can people even think that

[@stensoft]

I guess they were thinking of noise-cancelling headphones which generate sound waves with opposite phase. It may work for explosions as well but you would need to time it very exactly NOT at the same moment but so that the phase of one blast wave would be opposite of the other when it hits you. This means the first blast wave would need to hit you slightly before the second one which would be cancelled by the following low-pressure front. Still, the first blast wave would hit you at full pressure anyway.

[@alphamineron]

***** Well, I'm in High School and I haven't studied Wave Physics yet. It's should be Common Sense. People know how to read stocks, Sports Details, etc. But people don't have basic knowledge in Science. I totally blame the Education Systems used around the world for that.

[@TheRealBoof]

Well, the idea is that the shockwaves destructively interfere with each other. Unfortunately, these are pressure waves, and can not destructively interfere. This is the same reason why "noise canceling headphones" are misleading. You can't cancel pressure waves, but you CAN isolate your ears from outside noise.

[@alphamineron]

Boof yea, i know the science :)

[@TheMoonMan.]

Not misleading if the headphones actually have noise cancellation system - a microphone and a 180 degree phase shifting amplifier.

[@jonvdveen]

I hear that the you can cancel out the impact of an oncoming semi by having a second oncoming semi hit you from the exact opposite direction. 😉

[@quillanjacobson1478]

File this in the category of "did you really need to test this to figure out what was going to happen?"

[@binaryburnout3d]

is there a trough associated with a pressure wave from an explosion? Is there a vacuum created by the pressure moving outward? does it moves in waves? does an explossion cause ripples in air like a stone causes them in water? if so, is that vacuum equally as strong at the intersection of the explosions? So if the middle sensor was reading more that double the force, would it then experience double the vacuum after the shockwave?

[@uperdown0]

This is like putting a person between two cars, each speeding towards the other, and saying "Don't worry, they'll cancel eachother out!"

[@kabobawsome]

You could theoretically time them exactly so that the second bomb goes off (1.25*the period of the blasts' pressure waves) seconds later. That SHOULD cancel out the waves, but creates new problems, like a ridiculously precise spot of safety that's closer to the second explosion, the math required, exact timing (which is harder to do when the bombs are out of phase with one another), and also still the fact THAT THERE ARE TWO BOMBS GOING OFF NEXT TO YOU.

[@soccerguy2433]

nope

[@kabobawsome]

@@soccerguy2433 I mean, yes?. This is still true lmao, explosions are just pressure waves and therefore can be cancelled out by an equal force as long the waves are opposites. My math still checks out (I think, haven't been in a physics course for years lol). Like I said, it would just be at a single point and therefore useless practically. They almost certainly knew this at the time, but it wouldn't really have been relevant to the myth itself, which is was that it was SAFE to be there.

[@markmd9]

@@kabobawsome your math 😂😂😂 The math you never did? 😂 Blast waves can't overlap, look at their graph.

[@charles-antoinemartel-roy]

​@@kabobawsomepressure waves don't cancel out. Want physical proof? If you stand in between 2 speakers (sound waves are pressure waves) of equal loudness, does it feel quieter in the middle? It does not, which is why we use Stereo/Surround sound systems. In order to do active noise cancelling, headphones have microphones that pick up the outside frequencies and cancel them not with the same sound waves, but by emitting proportional inverted pressure waves.

[@dougaltolan3017]

The problem is that, unlike sound waves, explosions produce supersonic compressions. There is no opposite pressure strong enough, since that would require less than zero psi (not possible!) Atmospheric pressure is~ 14psi. To cancel a 50 psi (probably wrt to 1 atmosphere, so 64 psi absolute), you would need -36 psi (absolute) to maintain a comfy 1 atmosphere, that's less than 100% vacuum.

[@eleethtahgra7182]

Regarding waves. To cancel each other, opposing waves have to have half wave-length difference in distance. Equal distance means it would amplify each other. Even if u could place the 2nd explosion half-wave-length further, the first wave that reach u would kill u.

[@Corristo89]

This would be like two cars smashing into each other head-on at 100 mph: The force on impact would double, compared to the force the car would create if it was to smash into something stationary, like a massive rock or concrete block. The only way the force of the impact could be lessened would be if one car going at 100 mph was to hit a car in front of it going at 99 mph. Lessened, not cancelled out. Even then the car would exert the force of a car going at 1 mph. I'm not a physicist, so call out my bullshit if you want.

[@charlesleblanc1956]

Actually they tested that actual myth and ... busted it

[@TheMoonMan.]

That's actually another myth my friend. Smashing into a solid object at 100 mph creates the same amount of force as a head on collision with a second identical car also going 100 mph because a solid object has no give.

[@Chepe-501]

Remember how you’re told, “there are no such thing as stupid questions”? We’ll scrap that. (Nice excuse to play with explosives tho)

[@ripplecutbuddha]

Okay, so it was a pretty easy one to call, but hey, good excuse for blowin' stuff up anyway. :D

[@carlmwaamba9846]

This myth is just like saying that you will only feel half as much pressure when putting your head between 2 hydraulic presses

[@mennograafmans1595]

One word: Schrapnel.

[@tennoshenaniganizer9234]

Even without the shrapnel, the shockwaves would turn your organs into nutrient paste

[@mennograafmans1595]

@@tennoshenaniganizer9234 But even if the shockwaves would cancel each other out, if it wasn't just a crazy theory, the double amount of shrapnel would have killed you either way.

[@romanlegion5837]

It will never get more satisfying than watching a charge run through a fuse

[@auroragios]

Crest and tough needed to be collided, to make it zero, mean one trigger needs to be delay

[@maplesyrup2944]

+Omair Ahmed Exactly, they will double if two crests meet.

[@Leo1239150]

yep but you'd need to calculate the delay and get a bomb to sit in exactly the right place which probably takes a bit longer then the average fuse to burn down. So kinda impractical I guess. It's a nice experiment though

[@EsotericRogue]

Disagree, in general, since the cancellation would only happy at the point of intersection or after. Since the proposal is that someone could survive, the left side of their skull will take the full force of the left bomb, the right side of their skull will take the full force of the right bomb, and at best -- if the theory were correct -- the rippling left half of your skull would cancel out the rippling right half when they met at the center of your brain. 100% dead even if concussion waves were set perfectly to cancel out after they met. They don't meet until your skull has shredded your brain.

[@EsotericRogue]

wave's don't amplify or cancel out until they meet. That's too late.

[@EsotericRogue]

no, not immediately, the waves have to travel until they touch before they will be cancelled. The point of intersection is a point. Your head is wider than a point. Not >>>>>>(.)>.

[@DaHuntsman1]

This is the perfect example of after they heard it they were like: "Right, thats idiotic, but we're not only getting paid good money for this, but we get to also see a bunch of large explosions, so we'll do it"

[@Pir-o]

i gonna miss mythbusters

[@batuhandagl6826]

+Piro Man I, I don't get it, aren't they making new episodes??

[@lordilluvondy8494]

+Batuhan dağlı Yes, but on May 5th, 2016, they will air the "MythBusters Grand Finale"

[@marilynmanson3349]

didn't they not like each other?

[@gunmath6115]

im gunna myth the missbusters too bro..

[@kcanded]

I wish that Discovery would release all the Mythbuster episodes that are not currently out on a new set of DVDs. Ultimate Mythbuster, Mythbuster vs Jaws, Car Drop, Boarding a Plane, etc etc.

[@Qui-9]

How did such a ridiculous idea propagate strong enough to become a myth worthy of the Mythbuster's attention...??

[@kilroy987]

Simple - it gave them a reason to set off explosives.

[@Qui-9]

kilroy987 good call 🤘

[@superluckykc2449]

Kevlar Canuck: Dennis Hopper and Olie Anderson spread the legend with "suicide chair" stunt acts in the early 80s. kzbin.info/www/bejne/eJfIZJJ8ftp4ha8

[@dwwilliams19732013]

Kevlar Canuck they like to play with explosives

[@shanilka_wariyapperuma]

Shockwave can be referred as a vector, since it has a direction. But pressure isn't a vector, since it work in every direction. Shockwave can be cancelled , but pressure is add up. That's my interpretation. Your opinions are highly welcome.

[@NighteeeeeY]

Well might be because pressure is not a transversal electro-magnetic wave huh?

[@Schjoenz]

Not only that it doubled the pressure, but also double the amount of shrapnel striking the poor victim in the middle.

[@oljoelo]

obviously...

[@theolav12]

Answer to the question are you an idiot.

[@oljoelo]

+Balzsack mcdouchwad First, learn how to type in English. Then ask me.

[@witch3944]

Anyone that’s ever chosen the middle stall knew exactly how this was going to turn out.

[@cheeks3976]

Anyone who had frequency’s and waves in their physics class knows exactly how it would turn out

[@merinmentor4638]

Super imposition is the answer babessss

[@troyesivan4416]

Sometimes myths lead to very unexpected results. This was not one of those times. The result of this one was very obvious from the start.

[@Luchoedge]

well, DUH

[@evilpandakillabzonattkoccu4879]

+Lucho-Core i thought it was a 'well no shit' outcome as well. ;-)

[@the-thane]

This is pretty common knowledge. Intensity doesn't cancel out. The same effect happens with noise cancelling headphones. The headphones produce the antiwave of the incoming noise so that the waves cancel each other. The intensity doubles, though.

[@ASLTheatre]

Wow who'd of thought.

[@stacia2016]

I love that the shockwave shook the dust off of the nearby construction vehicle😂

[@ghhg-je8wv]

Only reason this myth exists is because of dragon ball z fans I swear. cancel out? come on people...

[@thatguymich2829]

It has nothing to do with dbz but okay

[@kilroy987]

Seeing that det cord wind around at hit each explosive at the exact same time was awesome.

[@nusarratshaikh4893]

Even if it was not a busted myth, nobody is that lucky to have two grenades thrown at them landing at the same distance from them and exploding at the same time.

[@hakumen9149]

At 7th grade the properties and principles concerning waves are taught to us. Two crests won't cancel each other. You need one crest and one trough

[@namdoyle]

Always remember that energy will never disappear.

[@chin4480]

Yes, both shockwave will cancel each other, but you are in the middle of both. It's like getting hit by 2 truck travel opposite direction.

[@chefone7645]

for those interesed this is the law of superposition and it happens in sound waves alot

[@igxniisan6996]

You're just gonn get squished between two shockwaves that's all

[@nullpoint3346]

Wave physics man. The slightest difference could either double or cancel the power with two.

[@Markus-zb5zd]

Yeah but aren't these shockwaves? And when you stand in-between the shockwaves will hit you before each other anyway

[@nighpaw4651]

William Zeppeli: *throws rock in pool* how do you stop a ripple Jonathan Joestar: *throws another rock* with another ripple

[@Warweazel]

You can do a similar experiment at home with a length of rope. When you wave one end, a wave rolls down the length. If you wave both ends, you'll see when the waves meet in the middle they actually keep going, and pass through each other.

[@Null--]

If you're about to get hit by a truck, magically conjoure another truck comming at you from the opposite side so they "cancel out" with you in the middle. Makes total sense.

[@GokantheHusky]

Right away I knew the answer. "Its the opposite of cancelling eachother out it doubled the power" Yeah because you got TWO bombs going off next to eachother.

[@TuxieBSOD]

They actually use this in atomic bombs, to make them more efficient. Put an array of explosives around the core, the pressure wave smashes into it and makes it smaller, triggering fission in the material.

[@kade426]

It's basically an explosive lensing effect. A nuclear bomb works by perfectly timing explosives around the core to compress it, wouldn't really work if it cancelled out.

[@scottbruner9266]

I had a good idea of the result. It was discovered in the 50’s & 60’s that detonating a nuclear weapon at or near ground level would cause more blast destruction because of a pressure wave reflecting off the ground meeting the primary blast wave and “adding up”.

[@FondlesHandles]

and that ladies and gentlemen is the difference between *constructive* interference and *destructive* interference.

[@jpao1834]

3:20 The shockwave cleared the "browness" color of the ground at the back lmao

[@Dave-me3bi]

waves only cancel out when it's a "dip" meeting a "bump"

[@bubblezovlove7213]

That's why the army uses airblast munitions. Even with nukes, bouncing that wave front into other wave fronts doubles the impact...

[@Kiyomi1238]

I mean on paper, theoretically, you would think they would cancel each other out. When two waves interfere, they would either cancel each other out… that is if one wave had a positive or crest and the other being negative or trough. But when two waves of the same operator interfere, they double causing a bigger wave.

[@phlave]

who would've guessed that constructing interference of waves would still work like it always does

[@justincarawan-carawanco.pu1639]

Easy way to test this at home - two hands slapping the water in a pool.

[@IgnatianMystic]

I knew this was busted from the get go. The cancellation effect happens with sound waves, not shock waves. One is a wave of vibration, the other is a wave of concussive force.

[@benthomason3307]

I'm only thirty seconds in and I can already say that this myth is absurd. It's like saying that getting hit by a car won't hurt you if you get hit by another identical car from the opposite direction at the same time.

[@Markus-zb5zd]

They just want a reason to blow stuff up

[@trikstari7687]

Left side exploded first, slow down the playback and you'll see it. It might seem inconsequential, but remember that in implosion bombs, nanoseconds determine whether you get Nagasaki or a fizzle.

[@teladithz7830]

Im assuming the individual/s who suggested this myth didn’t think before asking. Even if they cancel eachother out, the shrapnel(metal fragments) will kill you as it is basically the same as shooting a bullet at someone except the shrapnel is just multiple bits and pieces moving extremely fast and are very sharp. This ofcourse depends on the type of explosive you’re talking about but the same principal mostly holds up. It is not the shockwave that kills you, It is the shrapnel. The most the shockwave can cause to the human body at a reasonable amount of the explosive that is actually possible to get your hands on(Aka not an entire city or town worth) would be collapsing your lungs(It is avoidable though if you just open your mouth to your lungs). But i have to note that all of this is theoretical as i have not tried it to a human nor a substitute haha. But it is still fairly accurate.

[@user-zg5dl8fu5i]

Legends. Favorite show of my childhood