Great balls of fire
Editor’s note: As a paper we do not encourage any readers to go out and try this. If you decide to, please do so responsibly in a wide-open area away from anything flammable.
A little-known but growing fad at USU allows participants to enjoy each other’s company and pretend to be a dragon at the same time.
Fire breathing.
Julie Gillespie, a junior in family, consumer and human development, has been breathing fire for a couple years now.
“My roommate’s best friend had done it for family home evening one time and we wanted to try it,” she said. “So we bought all the stuff and went for it.”
The dry campus-friendly method employed by most combustible students uses corn starch instead of the traditional alcohol to fuel the flames.
The fire breather pours a small amount of starch into their mouth. They then spit it out over a lit lighter. The corn starch then catches flame, producing a small ball of fire.
“You don’t want to blow right into the flame,” said Joel Gillespie, a graduate student in computer science and Julie’s husband, who is an occasional fire-breathing partner. “That’ll just put it out.”
Both Gillespies said the secret was to spray the powder out as a mist, rather than a stream.
Students interested in trying fire breathing should be aware it may attract attention.
“[One time] our RA came out to talk to us,” Julie said. “We showed them and they thought it was the coolest thing.”
Not everyone they’ve ran into while fire breathing has been so understanding.
“Whenever you do this on campus, make sure you have someone willing to take the blame,” Joel said.
The risk of getting in trouble isn’t the only down side to gaining fire powers. Julie said the leftover corn starch in her mouth is less than pleasant.
“I’ve actually thrown up doing this,” she said.
These risks were not enough to dissuade Logan resident Melanie Clark who recently tried it for the first time.
“I fulfilled a dream,” she said. “One of the things I wanted to do while I was 22 was breathe fire.”
-steveshinney@cc.usu.edu