When I first moved into my current place the stove was really old. It had
rusty eyes that barely even worked, etc. One day I'm making some mashed
potatoes in a sauce pan when suddenly I'm treated with a fireworks show.
First a white flash, then a giant plume of sparks and smoke goes 5 feet into
the air. I frantically turn off the eye, and open the windows. When I come
back, I try to remove the pot and it's fused to the eye as if it had been
arc welded! There is a hole burned right through the bottom of the pot, and
near the point of the "explosion" both the pot and the eye are still in a
molten state! Until now I've had no idea, at all, how this could have
happened. The pot is anodized aluminum, and the eye is steel... Both of
which have melting points well over a thousand degrees. The amount of energy
necessary to bring them to a molten state in a matter of a few seconds is
enormous. There was no way it could have been the heat from the eye... Even
if there had been a short, or electrical problem I just don't see how it's
conceivable that that much heat could have been generated by any current
produced by a 220v wall outlet passing into an aluminum pot that isn't even
grounded! So how in the world could have this have happened?

Well, today I'm watching the history channel and they discuss a dated
technology used in WWII called "Thermite Grenades". Instead of creating an
explosion they are designed to generate a great deal of heat (upwards of
4000 degrees F) to sabotage machinery and what not without any sound. I
think, "woah, that's cool.". Then they show a demonstration of these
grenades in action and I happen to notice it looks exactly like the reaction
that occurred on my stove! Weird... molten sparks, thick grey smoke, fused
metal, the whole bit. But I didn't really put two and two together until
they began to explain how these grenades work.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermite

"A thermite reaction (a type of aluminothermic reaction) is one in which
*aluminum metal* is oxidized by the oxide of another metal, most commonly
*iron oxide*."

AHA!

Apparently, you can also create a thermite reaction with:

1) An non-stick anodized aluminum pot with aluminum exposed on the bottom.
2) A rusty stove eye (rust is also known as... iron oxide).
3) Heat from the eye.

Grreeattt... Has anyone else experienced anything like this? I'm going to
take a picture of the pot, it's pretty impressive. I wonder if there is way
to determine how hot it actually got by examining it.

Eric

(ps: yes I scraped the remaining potatoes out of the pot and ate them...
Mmmm... potatoes.)