The Hydrogen Balloon

Drew was always experimenting with stuff. He was one of the smarter kids in junior high school, and unlike some of the smart kids viewed as nerdy, Drew was well-liked.

Drew and I would walk home from school together, chatting about various things. His house rested between the school and my house.

On one particular day, Drew told me about an experiment he did with a piece of lead, hydrochloric acid, a balloon, and a glass Coke bottle. As he explained, you poured the hydrochloric acid into the bottle, dropped the lead into the acid, and quickly put the balloon over the mouth of the bottle, and it would fill up with gas that is lighter than air, causing it to float like a helium balloon.

He invited me into his house for a demonstration, and it worked.

I was mesmerized as I watched it float around the room. Not only did Drew thrill me with the demonstration, but he sent me home with a piece of lead, a balloon, and hydrochloric acid so I could try it myself. I couldn’t wait to get home.

I was careful to follow his instructions to the letter. But nothing happened. It didn’t float. I tried it again, but still nothing. “I’ll bet Bill (my stepfather) will know what to do,” I figured.

I marched upstairs with the balloon in hand, explained the process, and expressed confusion about why the balloon wouldn’t float.

He paused.

The pondering look on his face gave me hope that he knew how to resolve the dilemma, and soon my balloon would be freely floating around the house.

Taking out his cigarette lighter and moving it in circular motions underneath the balloon, he confidently said, “Let’s see if we can’t heat up those molecules and get them moving.”

It sounded good to me, considering I barely knew what a molecule was.

No sooner than the first circular pass began, the balloon exploded in a ball of fire unlike I had ever seen or could have imagined.

The rapid, repeated blinking of Bill’s eyes in an attempt to re-focus eyes that had been momentarily blinded by the flash of light, along with his singed eyebrows and hair on his arms, were clear indications that he didn’t know what he was talking about.

The molecules did much more than move about. They exploded in a ball of fire that almost blew up our house, let alone everyone in it.

We can’t always assume that just because someone is older, they know what to do with hydrogen gas-filled balloons that won’t float. But, from the experience, it is safe to assume that hydrogen gas is quite flammable.

Photo by Avinash Kumar on Unsplash