Many people believe that only those with superpowers can dip their hands into boiling oil without getting burned.
Is it Possible to Dip Your Hand into Boiling Oil Without Getting Burned?
Recently, netizens have been sharing the story of Mr. Prem Kumar (65), a chef in New Delhi, India, who possesses a remarkable talent. He has the ability that makes viewers hold their breath: he dips his bare hands into boiling oil to fry fish.
But looking closely, Mr. Kumar is just an ordinary person like everyone else. So does he have… superpowers, or is it that dipping one’s hand into boiling oil is not as dangerous as we think?
Dipping a Hand into Boiling Oil – An Impossible Task?
In reality, dipping a hand into water heated above 60 degrees Celsius can cause burns. Therefore, dipping hands into liquids with boiling points higher than that, such as boiling oil (around 200 degrees Celsius), is EXTREMELY DANGEROUS.
However, it is possible to be “safe and sound” when dipping a hand into boiling oil, just like Mr. Kumar. The answer lies in a physical phenomenon known as “the Leidenfrost effect.”
The Leidenfrost effect occurs when a liquid comes into contact with a surface that is significantly hotter than its boiling point. At this point, a portion of the liquid vaporizes, creating a thin insulating layer. You can observe this in the image below, where a red-hot steel ball is dipped into water.
This insulating layer slows down the evaporation process of the liquid. Notably, the rate of evaporation at this point is even slower than when the liquid is in contact with a surface at a temperature close to its boiling point.
A water droplet falling onto a hot pan (200 degrees Celsius) evaporates very slowly and can even hover due to the insulating vapor layer underneath.
By applying this principle, if you dip your hand into water, you could even dip your hand into… molten lead, which has a boiling point of about 450 degrees Celsius, as shown in the following experiment.
First, we melt the lead…
Dip your hand into the water and… do it quickly.
Water, when in contact with a surface of excessively high temperature (in this case, molten lead), forms an insulating layer, keeping our hand safe.
You can learn more about the ability to… dip your hand into molten lead in the video below.
Conversely, we can also dip our hands into liquid nitrogen without getting cold burns. At this time, our hands are at a much higher temperature than the boiling point of nitrogen (which is around -196 degrees Celsius).
In this case, liquid nitrogen takes on the role of water, forming a gas layer that insulates and keeps us safe (of course, only for a very short time).
* Note: All the experiments mentioned above are extremely dangerous, and you should NOT attempt them.
