oatssi Wrote:Got take a tank of hydrogen and shoot a hole in it. See what happens.

Nothing! Hydrogen, like petrol needs oxygen to burn, and as there is no oxygen inside the tank nothing will happen. However the hydrogen escaping from the hole will dissapate into the atmosphere (being lighter than air), whereas petrol will spill out creating a fire hazard and may end up polluting the ground around it.

Incidentally, when a carbon-based fuel like gasoline burns, glowing hot soot particles transfer the heat to its surroundings — potentially including you. But because hydrogen contains no carbon, it burns cleanly without a residue of hot soot, producing little radiant energy. This means that a victim would have to be practically in the flame in order to get burned.