Very broadly generalizing, there are two ranges to take into account in a grenade. The effective kill radius and the danger radius. The latter being far greater than the former. The kill radius is calculated from how far most of the shrapnel still has enough energy to kill reliably. The danger radius is how far some bigger, denser debris that could result from the grenade or what is near the grenade when it goes off can still seriously injure or kill someone but cannot be relied upon for a predictable effect. For reference, the kill radius of a modern M67 grenade is 5-15m, while the danger radius is 230-300m, depending what reference you look at.
Just because you are outside of the kill radius doesn’t mean that it is safe. Even if the Steinhandgranate 's ranges were only half of the M67’s, you still wouldn’t be able to throw it far enough to be safe while standing in direct line of sight with the explosion. The guy didn’t even have eye protection for crying out loud. Mind you, people had a whole different mindset about safety back then.
As I said, I wouldn’t feel comfortable doing it outside of an emergency, but the odds are that he was just fine. Comments in this thread are acting like this is certain instant death, when it more like unwise, unneeded risk that something bad might happen.
FWIW I’ve had bigger net explosive weight go off in line of sight, inside of the dangerous distance and it was fine. Would I do it just for a video? No. And I wouldn’t recommend it, but I’m not going to wither and faint that a guy (who is probably so caviler about it because he just went through WW2 and is numb to it) did it 70 years ago.
Very broadly generalizing, there are two ranges to take into account in a grenade. The effective kill radius and the danger radius. The latter being far greater than the former. The kill radius is calculated from how far most of the shrapnel still has enough energy to kill reliably. The danger radius is how far some bigger, denser debris that could result from the grenade or what is near the grenade when it goes off can still seriously injure or kill someone but cannot be relied upon for a predictable effect. For reference, the kill radius of a modern M67 grenade is 5-15m, while the danger radius is 230-300m, depending what reference you look at.
Just because you are outside of the kill radius doesn’t mean that it is safe. Even if the Steinhandgranate 's ranges were only half of the M67’s, you still wouldn’t be able to throw it far enough to be safe while standing in direct line of sight with the explosion. The guy didn’t even have eye protection for crying out loud. Mind you, people had a whole different mindset about safety back then.
As I said, I wouldn’t feel comfortable doing it outside of an emergency, but the odds are that he was just fine. Comments in this thread are acting like this is certain instant death, when it more like unwise, unneeded risk that something bad might happen.
FWIW I’ve had bigger net explosive weight go off in line of sight, inside of the dangerous distance and it was fine. Would I do it just for a video? No. And I wouldn’t recommend it, but I’m not going to wither and faint that a guy (who is probably so caviler about it because he just went through WW2 and is numb to it) did it 70 years ago.
C’mon, think about the views you’d get!
Hmmm, actually let me rephrase: I wouldn’t do it for a video anymore.