A YouTuber is recovering well after a rocket-propelled grenade (RPG) exploded in his hands as he was testing it for a video. US Army vet Adam Knowles runs the Ballistic High-Speed channel on YouTube. His team is not exactly sure what even happened during the accident, but they believe that the propellant for the grenade ignited too quickly.
The Ballistic High-Speed team was testing multiple rocket launchers the day that the accident happened. The RPG happened to be the last rocket they were testing that day.
Knowles is still recovering from his injuries. He experienced third-degree burns on about 10% of his upper body, mainly his arms. The blast also broke his jaw and fractured his skull. He had lacerations on his upper body, nerve damage to his facial muscles, and received several pieces of shrapnel from the explosion.
Now that Knowles is on the mend, he sat down with his team to watch the explosion several times. He’s lucky that he was wearing a helmet, tactical goggles, and a vest, otherwise he may very well not have survived the explosion. He probably would have been blinded or killed.
The team ran all their usual safety checks prior to Knowles firing the RPG, but something just went wrong. Despite the scary incident, Knowles is back and still working at Ballistic High-Speed.
The video of the explosion and the aftermath are below. Anyone who is sensitive to watching serious injuries should give this one a pass. As the team rushes to deliver medical attention to Knowles, they’re also dropping a lot of ‘F-bombs,’ so the language in this is NSFW.