Corrected entry: A group of Japanese soldiers, standing in a small circle in a cave, commit suicide one at a time, using grenades. Each grenade harms only the solder pulling the pin and no-one else. In reality, every grenade would have wounded and perhaps killed everyone in the group. (01:14:20)
Bruce Trestrail
30th Aug 2007
Letters From Iwo Jima (2006)
4th Sep 2007
Letters From Iwo Jima (2006)
Corrected entry: A group of solders, standing in a small circle in a cave, commit suicide, one at a time, using grenades. Four suicides are seen on camera. The time from arming the grenade to the explosion is less than two seconds in first, second and fourth suicide and about three second in third. Clearly, no army would equip it's soldiers with grenades that would explode faster than they could be thrown. (01:14:20)
Correction: Grenade fuses are commonly set to explode with 3.5 to 5.5 second fuses. some are set with no fuse, but to explode on impact. It doesn't take long to pull a pin and throw, certainly not more than 2 to 3 seconds, tops.
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Correction: People are mistaken about the power of hand grenades, caused by years of Hollywood blockbusters showing them virtually demolishing buildings. In reality, a small grenade from WW2, especially clutched to the chest like they did, will only kill that person, possibly small shrapnel wounds to those nearby. The TV show Mythbusters had the old "jump on a hand grenade to save your friends" myth (which turned out to be true) and many people were surprised by how small the explosion was of a grenade just sitting on the ground. Even ten feet away you could survive with maybe minor wounds.