Brilliant Blue Sulfur Fire is Beautiful, Toxic Mess

As we’ve learned before (and were reminded of again in this video), fire is usually yellow, orange, red, or one of those warm hues, but if you use a different fuel, you can get flames burning in pretty much any color you want. Recently, some folks in the Worland, Wyoming area learned that burning sulfur results in blue flames, because when a lot of leftover sulfur from the old Texas Gulf Sulfur Plant caught fire, it was very big, very blue, and very toxic ( via The Verge).

Worland volunteer fire department chief Chris Kocher responded to a call of a blue glow a few days ago, and when they arrived, they saw a large blue fire that moved quickly along the surface and was pretty engaging to watch, as evidenced by the 2.6 million views a video of the blaze has on Facebook right now.

It’s critical to point out that if you were to ever come upon a fire like that, it would be in your best interest to stay far away. Aside from it being a dangerous and hot fire, burning sulfur produces sulfur dioxide, which turns into sulfuric acid when combined with water, and that includes the moisture in your lungs. So, as you can imagine, simply breathing too close to a fire like this could have some really negative consequences.

Instead, just watch the video above and enjoy the lovely blue fire from afar, and let us know in the comments below what fuel you think produces the prettiest flames.

Featured image: Dodi Mulyana/Flickr