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Brooklyn Teens Making Marijuana Wax Severely Burned In Explosion
By
Christopher Robbins
Published Dec 18, 2013
Modified Dec 18, 2013
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Vice
By
Christopher Robbins
Published Dec 18, 2013
Modified Dec 18, 2013
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Two Brooklyn teenagers were severely injured early this morning after their attempt to make a potent concentrate of marijuana ended in an explosion.
The Daily News reports that 17-year-old Gabrielle Katanov and her 19-year-old boyfriend, Anthony Gambale, suffered second and third degree burns when one of them lit a cigarette while they soaked a thirty gallon tub of marijuana with butane in the garage of a Marine Park home (it's unclear whose).
“Their lungs are good . . . but from the waist up, all burned," Katanov's mother says. "Her hands, too. She could be in the hospital for a year. She needs surgery. The doctors said it will get worse every day."
Police say they found a "large amount" of marijuana, plants, storage containers, glass pans, and butane in the garage. One neighbor said of the 2:22 a.m. explosion, “We could see the flames and hear people yelling for help."
The substance the couple may have been trying to produce is ear wax hash or "honey oil," which has been a popular prong of the "dabbing" craze in the cannabis world. THC is extracted from plant matter by means of alcohol, butane, or other chemicals so the user is left with an extremely potent substance (naturally, there is a Vice video clip featuring the extraction process). As a result of the flammable chemicals necessary for the extraction, there have been scores of ear wax explosions.
Here a grower from San Diego named "scrapilon" waxing poetic about wax:
Tagged
brooklyn
marijuana
marine park
wax
Christopher Robbins
Christopher Robbins is a New York City reporter covering transportation, affordable housing, local politics, and criminal justice. His work has also appeared in New York Magazine, The Village Voice and The New York Times. Chris is a graduate of Patrick Henry High School in Roanoke, Virginia, and enjoys biking to Fort Tilden in the summertime.
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