MythBusters
MythBusters is an American science television program on the Discovery Channel starring Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman, two special effect specialists who set out to prove or disprove myths and urban legends of popular culture.
In Australia Mythbusters also airs in full on SBS free to air television and as an abridged segment on the Seven Network show Beyond Tomorrow.
The version shown on Discovery Channel in the UK features an additional British voiceover.
The mythbusters also hosted the 2005 edition of Discovery Channel's Shark Week. The opening episode for this was an episode of Mythbusters in which they examined five urban legends in the movie Jaws.
Format
Adam and Jamie perform experiments to prove popular myths and urban legends confirmed, plausible or "busted." They use their extensive building and engineering knowledge to construct devices to perform their experiments. In most cases when a myth involves the human body, they use either their crash test dummy, Buster, or ballistics gelatin, which is used to make a jello-like reproduction of the human body. Buster the dummy has had to be rebuilt extensively over the series, with one or two experiments nearly destroying it completely. Because some of the myths tested involve explosives, the resulting experiment is usually quite destructive. When an experiment proves a myth to be implausible, they will often go out of their way to create the conditions necessary for the desired result to occur, leading to many humorous moments.
Starting in Season Two, Adam and Jamie are also assisted by a small team refered to as "The Build Team", "MythBuilders". They often helped behind the scenes in the first season and became necessary on screen hosts because of the volume of work required to produce a show where one never knows what the results will be. This team will tackle a separate myth on their own, or asist in large scale mythbusting. During the second season the team was comprised of:
- Kari Byron
- Scottie Chapman
- Tory Belleci
- Grant Imahara, at the end of season two.
Toward the end of season two, Scottie Chapman left the show to be able to do more of her passion: metal working and, in her words, "Have a life." She was replaced by Grant Imahara, friend & sometimes coworker of Jamie & Adam and, most famously, certified operator of movie icon R2D2 for ILM. Grant also participated in Robot Wars/Battlebots, and has an electrical engineering degree, a helpful asset for the show.
Also aiding the crew for most of the second season was "Mythtern" Christine Chamberlain, helping out when needed and providing her own ideas and suggestions. She won the mythtern contest promoted by Discovery Channel. Christine, however, left the show at the end of season two, "for love", according to the producer.
Another personality from the first season and begining of the second is Heather Joseph-Witham, who explains the origins of many of the urban legends confronted on the show. Logistics of doing her segments and slight change of the shows format has ended her participation in the show at this time.
The Mythbusters typically perform their experiments in a variety of locations around San Francisco, when Jamie's M5 Industries shop is too small. For experiments requiring extensive safety zones, the decommissioned Naval Air Station Alameda, or Novato's decommissioned air station are regular venues.
Myths examined, and their status
Some of the myths the show has tried to "bust" include:
| Myth statement | Status | Notes |
| Eating poppy seeds can cause one to test positive for heroin on a drug test. | Confirmed | - |
| Driving while talking on a cellphone is just as dangerous as driving while intoxicated. | Confirmed | - |
| Using one's cellphone while pumping gas/petrol can cause an explosion. | Busted | The actual risk comes from an electrostatic discharge between a charged driver and the car. |
| CDs can shatter if placed in a high-speed (i.e. 40X or faster) CD-ROM drive. | Plausible | It was proven that a high rotation could shatter the CDs, but they could not achieve this using an average CD-Rom drive. |
| Drinking Pop Rocks and cola will cause one's stomach to explode. | Busted | |
| It's better to run, then walk in the rain. | Busted | Surprisingly. They will revisit this myth. |
| Is cola really able to ... | ||
| remove bloodstains? | Confirmed | - |
| clean rust? | Busted | - |
| dissolve a tooth overnight? | Busted | The tooth did start to dissolve, indicating that with enough time (and cola) it could be completely dissolved. |
| dissolve a steak? | Busted | - |
| clean a penny? | Confirmed | Results were surprisingly good. |
| A 4-year-old girl can be lifted by a bunch of party balloons. | Busted | It would require a ridiculously large amount of balloons (3500) |
| Ping-pong balls can be used to raise a sunken ship. | Confirmed | - |
| One can be killed by dropping an electrical appliance into a bath full of water | Confirmed | - |
| "Killer Quicksand" like in the movies really exists. | Busted | Quicksand is too dense, the body floats. |
| A penny dropped from a skyscraper lands with enough force to kill a pedestrian on the sidewalk below. | Busted | A penny's terminal velocity is not enough to go through human skin. |
| A Jetpack can be built from plans purchased off the internet and limited funds. | Busted | - |
| Overusing bug bombs can explode a house. | Confirmed | - |
| Tattoos can explode when exposed to an MRI. | Busted | - |
| A frozen turkey dropped unceremoniously into a deep-fat fryer will explode. | Busted | But it would make the oil boil over |
| Explosive decompression can occur when a bullet is fired through the fuselage of a pressurized airplane | Busted | The pressure is not high enough and the hole is too small. |
| An assassin can fire an ice bullet to kill someone without leaving a trace. | - | |
| Silicone breast implants may explode at high altitudes or low air pressure. | Busted | The implants are extremely flexible |
| An obese person can get stuck on an airline toilet | Busted | - |
| A boom lift can be turned into a catapult. | Busted | - |
| Can anything get rid of skunk stink? | Confirmed | Tomato juice did not work; a mixture of soap, hydrogen peroxide, and baking soda did. The formula may be found on Wikipedia's Skunk page. |
| Urinating on the electric third rail of a train track or an electric fence can cause electrocution. | Busted\Confirmed | Rail: busted. Fence: confirmed |
| Talking helps plants grow. | Partially plausible | Apparently any continuous sound helps |
| Jimmy Hoffa was buried in Giants Stadium. | Busted | - |
| The brown note can cause a human to lose control of their bowels. | Busted | - |
| Chinese water torture causes one to go crazy. | Confirmed | The torture is notably efficient |
| A body struck by a bullet will be propelled violently backwards. | Busted | A bullet fired by a gun cannot hold enough kinetic energy |
| Running a car with air conditioning on is more fuel efficient than running with the windows down. | Inconclusive | |
| A boat can be driven with its trailer still attached. | Confirmed | There is indeed a huge loss in maximum speed |
| A person can be electrocuted by talking on the phone or using the shower during a lightning storm. | Confirmed | Plausible with shower |
| A Civil War soldier impregnated a woman after being shot in the groin and having the bullet continue on into the woman in question. | Busted | No spermatozoan could be found alive |
| salsa was used by a mexican prisoner to dissolve his bars & escape. | Plausible | More plausible if used in conjunction with a direct current electrical source |
| Can a rowing team can pull a waterskier? | Confirmed | - |
| Could the famed Alcatraz escape have been successful? | Plausible | They did manage to reach the coast. |
| A Daddy long-legs spider has the most potent venom of all spiders, but is unable to pierce human skin. | Busted | - |
| A free energy device can be made to harness enough energy to power a house. | Busted | - |
| Did a tree cannon made overnight kill Hungarian townsfolk by exploding when first fired? | Busted\Plausible | Busted that they could make it in a night, but exploding is completely plausible |
| Holding a large sheet of plywood will slow a fall from a building enough to make it survivable. | Busted | The fall was almost completely uncontrollable and the impact was still deadly |
| A SCUBA diver can be sucked up by a firefighting helicopter and dumped on a forest fire. | Busted | Once out of the water the firefighting apparatus cannot keep enough suction to hold the diver in place. |
| Using various substances & tricks when drunk can beat the breathalyzer test. | Busted | None of the tested methods worked and a blood sample can always be requested by the police |
| It is possible to pick up radio signals through a tooth filling. | Busted | The tooth filling did not act as an antenna |
| A frozen chicken will penetrate aircraft or train windshields better than a thawed chicken. | Plausible | Originally, impact time or force transferred was the same for both frozen and thawed chickens. When re-visited, frozen chickens could penetrate better. |
| A goldfish's memory lasts only three seconds. | Busted | - |
| Metal piercings increase one's chances of being hit by lightning. | Busted | The lightning does seem to strike a pierced body more, but not the piercings directly |
| A high fall over water can be survived by throwing a hammer ahead of oneself and breaking the surface tension. | Busted | - |
| A Duck's quack does not echo. | Busted | - |
| A Corvette which has been fouled by a decomposing body cannot be cleaned up and sold. | Confirmed\Busted | Confirmed: the smell is too bad for anyone but a professional to tackle. Busted that the car won't sell (for parts, since interior was gone, but smell remained) |
| A bullet used to replace a fuse can go off and potentially shoot the driver. | Confirmed | - |
| Soldiers marching in unison can cause harmonic oscillation in a bridge and cause it collapse. | Busted | - |
| If a pressurized scuba tank is shot it will explode. | Busted | - |
| A Great White shark can pull barrels underwater (and hold them there). | Plausible\Busted | Plausible to pull them under, but busted to hold them there |
| A Great White shark can ram a dive cage with enough force to damage or destroy it | Confirmed | - |
| A Great White shark can pull a boat backwards with enough speed that waves break over the rear end. | Busted | - |
| Punching a shark in the nose, eyes, or gills will cause it flee or at least back off briefly. | Plausible | - |
Episodes
Mythbusters Specials
| # | Original Airdate | Title |
| 1 | 23-Jan-2003 | "Jet Assisted Chevy" |
| 2 | 23-Jan-2003 | "Airplane Toilet, Biscuit Bazooka, Leaping Lawyer" |
| 3 | 07-Mar-2003 | "Lawn Chair Balloon, Poppy Seed Drug Test, Goldfinger" |
Season One
| # | Original Airdate | Title |
| 1 | Sept. 23, 2003 | "Ice Bullet, Exploding Toilet, Who Gets Wetter?" |
| 2 | Oct. 03, 2003 | "Cell Phone Destruction, Silicone Breasts, CD-ROM Shattering" |
| 3 | Oct. 10, 2003 | "Barrel of Bricks, Pissing on the Third Rail, Eel Skin Wallet" |
| 4 | Oct. 17, 2003 | "Penny Drop, Deadly Microwaves, Radio Tooth Fillings" |
| 5 | Oct. 24, 2003 | "Hammer Bridge Drop, Buried Alive, Cola" |
| 6 | Nov. 7, 2003 | "Lightning Strikes Tongue Piercing, Tree Cannon, Beat the Breath Test" |
| 7 | Dec. 5, 2003 | "Stinky Car, Raccoon Rocket" |
| 8 | Dec. 12, 2003 | "Escape From Alcatraz, Duck Quack, Stud Finder" |
| 9 | Jan. 18, 2004 | "Chicken Gun, Octopus Egg Pregnancy, Killer Washing Machine" |
| 10 | Feb. 22, 2004 | "Explosive Decompression, Frog Giggin', Rear Axle" |
| 11 | Jan. 25, 2004 | "Sinking Titanic, Goldfish Memory, Trombone Explosion" |
| 12 | Jan. 25, 2004 | "Break Step Bridge, Toothbrush Surprise, Rowing Water Skier" |
| 13 | Feb. 15, 2004 | "Buried in Concrete, Daddy—Longlegs, Jet Taxi" |
Season Two
| # | Original Airdate | Title |
| 14 | June 8, 2004 | "Myths Revisited" |
| 15 | July 27, 2004 | "Scuba Diver, Car Capers" |
| 16 | Sept. 29, 2004 | "Ancient Death Ray, Skunk Cleaning, What Is Bulletproof?" |
| 17 | Oct. 6, 2004 | "Elevator of Death, Levitation Machine" |
| 18 | Oct. 13, 2004 | "Beat the Radar Detector" |
| 19 | Oct. 20, 2004 | "Quicksand" |
| 20 | Oct. 27, 2004 | "Exploding Jawbreaker" |
| 21 | Nov. 3, 2004 | "Pingpong Rescue" |
| 22 | Nov. 10, 2004 | "Boom-Lift Catapult" |
| 23 | Nov. 16, 2004 | "Exploding House" |
| 24 | Dec. 5, 2004 | "Ming Dynasty Astronaut" |
| 25 | Feb. 16, 2005 | "Brown Note" |
| 26 | Feb. 23, 2005 | "Salsa Escape" |
| 27 | March 2, 2005 | "Exploding Port-a-Potty" |
| 28 | March 9, 2005 | "Is Yawning Contagious?" |
| 29 | March 23, 2005 | "Cooling a Six-Pack" |
| 30 | March 30, 2005 | "Son of a Gun" |
| 31 | May 18, 2005 | "Breaking Glass" |
| 32 | June 9, 2005 | "Jet Pack" |
| 33 | June 22, 2005 | "Killer Brace Position" |
| 34 | July 13, 2005 | "Bulletproof Water" |
| 35 | July 27, 2005 | "Border Slingshot" |
| 36 | August 3, 2005 | "Killer Tissue Box" |
| 37 | August 10, 2005 | "Escape Slide Parachute" |