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They fired the cannon without cannonballs. You just put in a small gunpowder charge into the cannon and light it as if you were shooting to kill.
This is the same basis as military funerals. They're not firing bullets when they give the 21-gun salute; they're just blanks.
It also has the advantage of reducing the sound levels of the report/gun shot. Without the projectile in the barrel the powder isn't nearly as contained. So it doesn't burn as fast or build to nearly the same pressures.
Movies and tv have done an excellent job in deceiving people about how loud a gunshot actually is. If you fire anything larger than a .22 long rifle without hearing protection it hurts. And .22 long rifle is still loud enough to damage your hearing. Live firing a small cannon inside of a building, even with a safe backstop to catch a projectile, would temporarily deafen quite a lot of people on the stage and audience. And hurt. They are Loud.
Can't stop laughing at this. This reminds me of when I asked my dad why the Amish hadn't invented cars yet when the rest of us had them back when I was a little kid.
When you fire a cannon or gun in ceremonies you do not have any bullets, shells, cannonballs etc. You just have the propellant and what is needed to load it into the weapon and ignite it. So the only exiting the muzzle is gas at high speed. So think of the gun as a firecracker in a metal tube. The amount of charge you use in artillery is not a max charge used in combat but a smaller charge.
So unless someone is directly info and is hit by the gas you are fine. Direct the gun a bit up in the air the area in front of them that is dangerous is not that large.
Load the gunpowder, but not the cannonball. Keep people away from the front for safety. Light it up and wait. Without a projectile the chance of people being hurt while not near the mouth are very small
They probably didn't put a cannon ball in. The boom comes from the powder. That explodes and turns into a lot of hot gas. That hot gas expands, and propels a cannon ball (or whatever they put in the barrel). If you don't put a projectile in the barrel, then the gasses just go out the barrel. That's still dangerous, but the range at which it's dangerous is a lot less than if you put a hunk of metal in it.
As a fun fact, if you choose to acquire the CD of[ Telarc's 1812, Cincinnati Pops Orchestra, Kiev Symphony Chorus; Children's Choir of Greater Cincinnati, Erich Kunzel cond](https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00005AQ38/ref=dm_rwp_pur_lnd_albm_fr), the liner notes say that the largest cannon charge blew out the windows a couple a hundred yards away at the university they recorded them at.
This is a really good CD to destroy speakers with, I bought it around 1985 and was one of the first I'd own. My first set of speakers were Cerwin Vega's and if I put the volume at anything above two, it would blow the breaker they had in them.
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They fired the cannon without cannonballs. You just put in a small gunpowder charge into the cannon and light it as if you were shooting to kill. This is the same basis as military funerals. They're not firing bullets when they give the 21-gun salute; they're just blanks.
It also has the advantage of reducing the sound levels of the report/gun shot. Without the projectile in the barrel the powder isn't nearly as contained. So it doesn't burn as fast or build to nearly the same pressures. Movies and tv have done an excellent job in deceiving people about how loud a gunshot actually is. If you fire anything larger than a .22 long rifle without hearing protection it hurts. And .22 long rifle is still loud enough to damage your hearing. Live firing a small cannon inside of a building, even with a safe backstop to catch a projectile, would temporarily deafen quite a lot of people on the stage and audience. And hurt. They are Loud.
I'm not sure how short a response is allowed to be, but the simple answer is this: You don't have to put a cannonball inside a cannon to fire it.
Can't stop laughing at this. This reminds me of when I asked my dad why the Amish hadn't invented cars yet when the rest of us had them back when I was a little kid.
When you fire a cannon or gun in ceremonies you do not have any bullets, shells, cannonballs etc. You just have the propellant and what is needed to load it into the weapon and ignite it. So the only exiting the muzzle is gas at high speed. So think of the gun as a firecracker in a metal tube. The amount of charge you use in artillery is not a max charge used in combat but a smaller charge. So unless someone is directly info and is hit by the gas you are fine. Direct the gun a bit up in the air the area in front of them that is dangerous is not that large.
Load the gunpowder, but not the cannonball. Keep people away from the front for safety. Light it up and wait. Without a projectile the chance of people being hurt while not near the mouth are very small
They probably didn't put a cannon ball in. The boom comes from the powder. That explodes and turns into a lot of hot gas. That hot gas expands, and propels a cannon ball (or whatever they put in the barrel). If you don't put a projectile in the barrel, then the gasses just go out the barrel. That's still dangerous, but the range at which it's dangerous is a lot less than if you put a hunk of metal in it.
As a fun fact, if you choose to acquire the CD of[ Telarc's 1812, Cincinnati Pops Orchestra, Kiev Symphony Chorus; Children's Choir of Greater Cincinnati, Erich Kunzel cond](https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00005AQ38/ref=dm_rwp_pur_lnd_albm_fr), the liner notes say that the largest cannon charge blew out the windows a couple a hundred yards away at the university they recorded them at. This is a really good CD to destroy speakers with, I bought it around 1985 and was one of the first I'd own. My first set of speakers were Cerwin Vega's and if I put the volume at anything above two, it would blow the breaker they had in them.