Slashdot Mirror
Bomb Squad Searches House Over Teenager's Chemistry Experiments
McGruber writes: On Wednesday, authorities in the south Fulton County, Georgia town of Hapeville shut down a street for hours and used their bomb squad to search a home. According to the suspect's father, the bomb scare started after his 18-year-old son was arrested for trespassing, entering an abandoned warehouse and salvaging mercury switches, which can be used to detonate explosives. When police searched the teen's home on Virginia Avenue at Rainey Avenue in Hapeville, they said they found chemicals inside. "He's not building bombs. He does do a lot of experiments. A lot of them I don't fully understand, but I'm certain he's not making bombs," said the suspect's father, Allen Mason. Mason says chemistry is his son's hobby and he wants to be a chemical engineer. Mason also said police told him what they found is not illegal to own. One neighbor, who couldn't return home for hours, said he didn't feel the teen was a threat. "I don't see a problem with this, but you have to trust the authorities in they're doing what they think is best," said Curtis Ray. In February 2015, Hapeville authorities evacuated businesses and called out the bomb squad to investigate a pinhole camera that was part of a Georgia University Art Project.
I love how they say that Mercury switches can detonate explosives, ... even coffee pots can be considered "bomb making equipment" in their eyes.
That's why the (nearly empty) cup of coffee on the table next to me was made in a small saucepan on the stove. Actually, it's mostly because it makes better-tasting coffee than any of the coffee makers that we have stored in the basement, to be brought out when we have a crowd. And I can easily make just one cup, which is normally all I want. (My wife doesn't drink the stuff; she prefers tea, which she also makes in a cup or in a small pitcher for groups).
Of course, there's a potential danger that the authorities will hear about this, investigate, and decide that I'm making coffee via a Middle-Eastern method, which makes me a terrorist suspect. OTOH, I actually learned the method from my Scandinavian friends and relatives in the Mid-West, so maybe it's OK. And on the third hand, Scandinavians are all liberal socialists, don'cha know?
In any case, it's getting hard to find anything that can't be considered part of bomb making. Are you breathing oxygen? Don't you know that most explosives work via a reaction with oxygen in the air?
Those who do study history are doomed to stand helplessly by while everyone else repeats it.
While tempting, it would probably be a bad idea to send a cheerful reply of "I had no idea about that, but thanks for letting me know"