Sunday afternoon Tannerite blast shakes area

By Shawn Cunningham
© 2019 Telegraph Publishing, LLC

Area residents from Springfield to Andover heard and even felt an explosion Sunday afternoon that left many speculating what had happened, including that there might have been an earthquake.

According to Vermont State Police Patrol Commander Bryson Lunderville, a homeowner in Cavendish had taken “a large quantity” of Tannerite to an area on the back side of his property and detonated it. Troopers estimated that it may have been around 50 pounds of the explosive.

Tannerite is a stable explosive that must be mixed before it is used as an exploding rifle target. Small amounts are used to indicate a hit on a target at a long distance.

The call originally came in as a call for a game warden to investigate, according to Lunderville, but then he received it at 12:49 p.m. He estimated that the actual explosion took place around 12:30 p.m.

There was no damage reported aside from a lamp that fell off a neighbors table although the explosion was heard as far away as Popple Dungeon Road in Chester. And a number of Cavendish residents, commenting on the Cavendish Vermont Facebook page, reported that their homes were shaken by the explosion.

According to Lunderville, the man who set off the explosion “had no idea what he was doing was wrong.” But there were no charges in the incident.

Last year, a gender reveal using Tannerite sparked the 47,000-acre Sawmill Fire in Arizona that caused more than $8 million in damage.

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Filed Under: Latest News

About the Author:

RSSComments (5)

Leave a Reply | Trackback URL

  1. Richard Williams says:

    It’s legal to grow opium poppies, but illegal to extract the opium and smoke it. It’s legal to grow Ccastor beans but when you use them to make Ricin, that’s terrorism. You can buy ammo legally, but if you open the rounds and make a pipe bomb with it, that’s illegal. You can have eucalyptus bushes in front of your house, but if you grind up the leaves and feed them to your neighbors dog. … well, you get the idea. Just because something is legal, doesn’t mean it can’t also be incredibly stupid and dangerous.

  2. Tom Knockenhauer says:

    I thought a snow plow was driving down the road

  3. Tim Roper says:

    Here, hold my beer. Now, watch this!

  4. John wismann says:

    Obviously there was no foul people just having fun
    GOD FORBID GIVE IT A REST 🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸

  5. J. King says:

    The man did nothing wrong in exploding Tannerite. You are legally allowed 49.99# for personal possession and use. I am offended that this article implied there was any wrong doing. Of course, the author never *said* that there was wrong doing but made sure that was the take-away.