‘Works Bomb’ Detonated at Philadelphia School

A student at Feltonville School of Arts and Sciences detonated a homemade explosive, a "works bomb," outside his school earlier this week.

A bomb went off in the yard outside a Feltonville school earlier this week, and a student has been charged. The City Paper‘s Dan Denvir reports the student, whose name has not been released, detonated what’s called a “works bomb” just outside the Feltonville School of Arts and Sciences on Wednesday.

What’s a works bomb? It’s a cheap homemade explosive made with toilet bowl cleaner The Works. This now-censored article with directions provides the info — chemicals in bathroom cleaners like The Works mix with the aluminum in tin foil and causes a pretty big explosion.

When I was a kid, we used Drano for these purposes — but we’d never do something stupid like bring them to school. Oh, wait, a friend of mine (in grade school!) actually did bring a Drano bomb to school and it exploded in his backpack. Somehow, he got away without getting in any trouble — or getting hurt. Fortunately, he must have constructed it poorly.

The student, City Paper writes, faces a felony charge for causing or risking catastrophe, as well as related charges.

[City Paper]