Can people drink rocket fuel?

Layan Zeitoun
3 min readJan 19, 2022

Welllll, yes and no.

For instance, methane and kerosene can aggressively choke you to death; that is for sure. Furthermore, these fuels will flow into your respiration system; reach out to your lungs. And with their abundance in your chest: these fuels may and will take up the room of your oxygen, leading to an inevitable pneumonia-like condition, irreversible lung damage, or can cost your life if you are in a severe condition. On the other hand, ethanol would never cause such troubles.

Interestingly, conventional day-to-day alcohol has a long history of firing our rockets and expanding our wonders. Even the world’s first designated ballistic missile fuel was ethanol, a pervasively consumed alcoholic drink in our lives. Further, in the final stages of the V-2 rocket manufacturer program, the fuel alcohol tank had a 75% ethanol to 25% water ratio, which aided in cooling the engine temperature and prevented it from burning up. However, prior to the settlement on adopting alcohol with liquid oxygen as a propellant, there were numerous fluctuations on whether not to proceed with ethanol. Ultimately, the V-2 scientists carried on with ethanol, and many were pleased by this matter.

To elaborate on a notion to acquire a better grasp further on. With a 75% ethanol ratio to 25% water, you solely need to double the water concentration in this case to get vodka. Hence, in this scenario, you can drink rocket fuel after adjusting it, which people back in the day promptly noted. So the question is: did they sincerely consume that fuel? yes. Why? alcoholism. Following, the phenomenon of the scientist personnel drinking the rocket fuel was initiating a regression in advancing the V-2 technology, making it a pressing dilemma at the rocket facility. Thus, procedures were undertaken to preclude the unceasing drinking problem. First, they endeavored to add a disagreeable pink dye to the fuel to make it undrinkable. However, someone had discovered a method of purifying the fuel with potatoes in a week. Secondly, they attempted to compound the alcohol with a laxative, which caused many to run Frenzily to the nearest restroom. Still, people kept drinking the fuel until the adjunct of methanol to the ethanol, which cost someone his vision and another his life. It may occur to you that this is grim; well, leaders have given out demands to display these physiques as a warning to whom desire to sabotage the process of the V-2 rocket development; marking that drinking the fuel rocket had caused so many setbacks.

Fun fact, there is a notorious drink named the ‘’ rocket fuel’’, which is served in Fire Island, New York, that promises to knock your pants off. And then again, yes my friend, you can drink rocket fuel.

--

--