Tag - Mentos Hoax

Human Volcano – Wonder How Many Kids Tried This Mentos & Diet Coke Hoax?

While you may have never tried it, let’s be honest… you’ve thought about trying it… or making someone else try it. Drink as much Diet Coke as possible and then eat a few Mentos. It’s every 8th grader’s dream… either you spew a volcano of soda or you explode. Either way, it’s funny. Last night episode of Two and a Half Men just proves that one of the show’s writers is a science geek with a sense of humor.

Although I’m sure thousands of people (okay, 8th graders) have tried it, you just can’t turn your body into a human volcano with erupting geysers of diet soda. During the first year of my agreement with the company that makes Mentos (Perfetti Van Melle), there were rumors of a Brazilian boy who drank a bottle of soda and chased it with a roll of Mentos… and he exploded. I was asked by PVM to explain the science of why this can’t happen. This lead to the writers at snopes.com posting a great article on the Mentos and Diet Coke reaction with a reference to our site as part
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Mentos Diet Coke Hoax – Can You Explode by Drinking Diet Coke and Eating Mentos?

There is an urban myth spreading via the Internet that a little boy in Brazil died after eating Mentos and drinking Diet Coke.  The claim is that the Mentos released all of the carbon dioxide from the soda, the boy’s stomach swelled up and he exploded. While it sounds great on paper or as part of a viral e-mail that hit your inbox, nothing could be further from the truth.

Eating Mentos and drinking diet soda might make you burp, but you’re not going to puff up and explode. When you drop Mentos into a bottle of soda, it’s the tiny craters or imperfections on the surface of the Mentos that serves as a meeting place for the bubbles of carbon dioxide gas dissolved in the liquid to collect. Since the Mentos are heavy and rest on the bottom of the bottle, the expanding and escaping bubbles push the liquid out of the bottle, creating the popular soda geyser effect.

If you’ve ever tried to chug a can or a bottle of soda, it probably one took about four seconds before you amazed everyone with your super burp. Your mouth and throat provide plenty of opportunity for
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