Reply #76: Looks like white phosphorus to me

[krispos42]

It's used as a smoke-generating agent but can be misused as an anti-personnel/incendiary agent.

In this case it looks like an artillery shell was filled with chunks of WP. Well, not "chunks"; carefully designed and cut pieces, but you get the idea. And in the middle of the pieces of WP is a bursting charge linked to either some kind of timer or a radar or barometric altimeter.

The bursting charge ignites the pieces of WP and scatters them in a shotgun-like pattern. The pieces of WP land on the ground and start burning fiercely, sending up clouds of obscuring smoke for several minutes.



If it bursts on the ground it would send WP shrapnel out. WP self-ignites it the presence of oxygen, so wherever it landed, it would burst into flame.

"Elementary Productions: White Phosphorus"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oke8GinWDG8