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50 free Dynamite trivia questions with answers — science & nature quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This dynamite trivia quiz is mostly about the real thing: the nitroglycerin-soaked explosive that Alfred Nobel patented in 1867 and that blasted the tunnels, mines and railways of the modern world. The easy questions are the ones any science fan knows: who invented it, what it is made of, the Greek word behind the name, and why it is not the same as TNT. From there it moves into the chemistry and the history: the Italian who first made nitroglycerin and begged people not to use it, the explosion that killed Nobel's brother, the fossil algae that made nitro safe to carry, the blasting cap, and the shelf life of a stick. The harder end is for people who like the details: the percentages behind '40% dynamite', why boxes have to be turned over in storage, the South African gold-mine factories that once led the world, the DuPont breakup, the ammonium and military versions, and the myth of the 'merchant of death' obituary. Because the word has escaped the quarry, the last stretch covers dynamite in pop culture: the BTS and Taio Cruz hits, J.J.'s catchphrase on Good Times, the British Bulldog wrestler, and a nerdy kid from Preston, Idaho. Every answer was checked against encyclopaedia entries on dynamite, nitroglycerin, Alfred Nobel and the songs and shows named before publishing, and the supporting sentence is stored with each question. For the inventor's whole life and the prizes, try our Alfred Nobel trivia quiz.
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Q 01In which year was dynamite patented?
1867
1867: Nobel patented dynamite in Britain in May 1867 and in Sweden that October, with a US patent following in 1868.
Q 02Dynamite is usually sold with a 'weight strength', or nitroglycerin content, in what range?
20% to 60%
20% to 60% nitroglycerin by weight is the usual range for commercial dynamite, so a 60% stick holds three times the nitroglycerin of a 20% stick of the same size.
Q 03In which city was Alfred Nobel born in 1833?
Stockholm
Stockholm: Alfred Nobel was born there on 21 October 1833, the third of the four Nobel brothers who survived to adulthood; the Nobel Prize ceremonies have been held in the city since 1901.
Q 04In which country was dynamite invented, at Geesthacht?
Germany
Germany: Nobel developed dynamite in the mid-1860s at the Alfred Nobel & Co. works at Krümmel, near Geesthacht outside Hamburg, a factory he had founded in 1865.
Q 05Which Italian chemist first synthesised nitroglycerin in the 1840s?
Ascanio Sobrero
Ascanio Sobrero made nitroglycerin in Turin in 1847, called it pyroglycerin, and warned against using it as an explosive after a laboratory blast scarred his face.
Q 06What did Nobel find that finally stabilised nitroglycerin into a portable explosive?
Diatomaceous earth
Diatomaceous earth, or kieselguhr, a crumbly sediment of fossil diatom shells, soaked up about three times its weight of nitroglycerin and turned it into a paste that could be shaped into sticks.
Q 07Which river near Nobel's Hamburg factory supplied the fossil-algae absorbent that made dynamite possible?
Elbe
Elbe: the absorbent was dredged from the Elbe near Nobel's Krümmel works at Geesthacht, upstream of Hamburg, and mixed roughly three to one with nitroglycerin.
Q 08Which device did Nobel invent to detonate nitroglycerin safely from a distance?
The blasting cap
The blasting cap: Nobel's detonator, a small copper capsule of a sensitive primary explosive fired by a fuse, set off the nitroglycerin charge by shock and was perfected in 1865.
Q 09Which member of Nobel's family died in the 1864 nitroglycerin explosion at Heleneborg?
His brother Emil
His brother Emil, aged 20, was one of five people killed when the family's Heleneborg shed blew up on 3 September 1864; the city authorities then banned nitroglycerin work inside its limits.
Q 10Which three chemicals did Nobel's 1864 patent use to synthesise nitroglycerin?
Sulfuric acid, nitric acid and glycerin
Sulfuric acid, nitric acid and glycerin: the glycerin is dripped into a chilled mixture of the two acids, the nitric acid nitrating it and the sulfuric acid absorbing the water formed.
Q 11Where did Nobel build the Nitroglycerin Aktiebolaget works after the Heleneborg disaster?
Vinterviken
Vinterviken, a secluded bay on Lake Mälaren just outside the city limits, housed the Nitroglycerin Aktiebolaget works from 1865, after the Heleneborg blast ended nitroglycerin work inside the city.
Q 12Dynamite was the first safely manageable explosive stronger than which older explosive?
Black powder
Black powder, the gunpowder used for blasting since the 17th century, was far weaker; dynamite rapidly replaced it in mining, quarrying and tunnelling.
Q 13Roughly how much energy does a standard 190-gram stick of dynamite contain?
1 megajoule
Q 21Where was the only US dynamite plant in operation in the early 2020s?
Carthage, Missouri
Carthage, Missouri: the plant there was the last in the United States turning out nitroglycerin dynamite in the early 2020s; rival brands sold in the country were made there and relabelled.
Q 22Why do cartoons like Bugs Bunny label every bomb 'TNT' rather than dynamite?
The initialism was shorter and needed no literacy
The confusion between the two explosives largely comes from those cartoons.
Q 23Why has dynamite never been popular in warfare?
1 megajoule, roughly: a standard 190-gram stick, a cardboard cylinder about 200 mm long and 32 mm across, holds about a million joules, comparable to the food energy in a chocolate bar.
Q 14What does the 'dope' in dynamite refer to?
The absorbent medium mixed with stabiliser
The absorbent medium mixed with stabiliser is the 'dope': in a 40% dynamite, 40% of the weight is nitroglycerin and the other 60% is dope such as wood pulp and sodium carbonate.
Q 15What is the recommended maximum shelf life of nitroglycerin dynamite?
One year
One year from manufacture is the recommended maximum for nitroglycerin dynamite under good storage; beyond that the sticks degrade and become more sensitive to shock and friction.
Q 16Why do explosives manuals recommend regularly turning boxes of stored dynamite upside down?
Because sticks weep nitroglycerin that pools at the bottom
Because sticks weep nitroglycerin that pools at the bottom, turning the boxes over redistributes it; pooled nitroglycerin and the crystals that form on old sticks are far more shock-sensitive than fresh dynamite.
Q 17In drop-hammer tests, which of these detonates from the smallest drop height?
Mercury fulminate
Mercury fulminate, the classic primary explosive, detonates under a 2 kg drop hammer from just 1-2 cm, against about 4-5 cm for nitroglycerin and 15-30 cm for dynamite.
Q 18Which country was the world's largest dynamite producer for decades from the 1940s?
South Africa
South Africa was the world's biggest dynamite maker for decades from the 1940s, feeding the Witwatersrand gold mines from the AECI plants at Modderfontein and Somerset West.
Q 19Who first manufactured dynamite in the United States, under exclusive rights from Nobel?
Giant Powder of San Francisco
Giant Powder of San Francisco, founded with Nobel's exclusive American licence, began making dynamite in 1868 at Rock House Gulch, now part of San Francisco's Glen Canyon Park.
Q 20Which two companies were formed when DuPont's explosives monopoly was broken up?
Hercules and Atlas
Hercules and Atlas: the 1912 antitrust decree against DuPont's 'Powder Trust' spun off the Hercules Powder Company and the Atlas Powder Company, both based at first in Wilmington, Delaware.
It degenerates quickly and can be set off by fire or a bullet
It degenerates quickly and can be set off by fire or a bullet, so dynamite was never a practical munition; TNT, by contrast, is insensitive enough to be melted and cast into shells.
Q 24At what temperature can TNT be melted so it can be poured into shells?
81 °C
81 °C (about 178 °F) is TNT's melting point, low enough to melt it safely in steam-heated vessels and pour it into shells, after which it re-solidifies unchanged.
Q 25TNT was first made in 1863 for what purpose?
A yellow dye
A yellow dye: Julius Wilbrand prepared trinitrotoluene in 1863 as a dyestuff, and the compound was so insensitive that its explosive potential went unrecognised until Carl Häussermann's work in 1891.
Q 26Which army adopted TNT as a shell filling in 1902?
The German
The German army adopted TNT as a shell filling in 1902, calling it Füllpulver 02, and the British followed with 'Trotyl' in 1907.
Q 27What did Russell Penniman's cheaper 1885 'Extra' dynamite substitute for nitroglycerin?
Ammonium nitrate
Ammonium nitrate has only 85% of nitroglycerin's chemical energy but is much cheaper.
Q 28What is the main ingredient of so-called 'military dynamite' (M1)?
RDX
It is 75% RDX and 15% TNT, with only 60% of the strength of commercial dynamite but far safer to store.
Q 29Which more powerful jelly-like explosive did Nobel patent in 1876?
Gelignite
Gelignite, or blasting gelatin, dissolved collodion nitrocellulose in nitroglycerin to make a stable, water-resistant jelly more powerful than dynamite; Nobel patented it in 1876.
Q 30How many patents did Alfred Nobel hold in his lifetime?
355
355 patents: Nobel filed his first, for a gas meter, in 1857 at the age of 24, and registered inventions across Europe in the six languages he spoke.