Elon Musk loves high-tech toys.
The billionaire entrepreneur, who heads SpaceX and the electric-car company Tesla, unveiled a new line of flamethrowers for his tunneling project, The Boring Company, over the weekend with a wild Instagram video.
In the 7-second video, Musk fires up the flamethrower; runs at the camera with a big, goofy smile on his face; and then finally veers away amid peals of laughter.
“Don’t do this. Also, I want to be clear that a flamethrower is a super terrible idea. Definitely don’t buy one. Unless you like fun,” Musk wrote in the Saturday (Jan. 27) Instagram post.
Musk promised that The Boring Company — which aims to ease traffic congestion in cities around the world by building subterranean thoroughfares — would sell the limited-edition, branded flamethrowers after the firm sold more than 50,000 hats in 2017.
You can preorder one of the gadgets for $500, plus shipping and taxes, here: boringcompany.com/flamethrower . You can also get a Boring-branded fire extinguisher at the same site, for $30.
If you think this is all an elaborate joke, you can cite for support some of Musk’s playful recent tweets, such as this one, from Sunday (Jan. 28): “But wait, there’s more: the flamethrower is sentient, its safe word is ‘cryptocurrency’ and it comes with a free blockchain.”
But wait, there’s more: the flamethrower is sentient, its safe word is “cryptocurrency” and it comes with a free blockchain
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 29, 2018
But a few hours later, Musk tweeted “7K,” an apparent claim that 7,000 folks have put orders down for the Boring flamethrower. And you can indeed put a flamethrower and a fire extinguisher in your cart at the site listed above, which also features a PayPal link. Maybe this flamethrower business is a welcome stress reliever for Musk, who is gearing up for the maiden launch of SpaceX’s huge new Falcon Heavy rocket on Feb. 6 .
If you do order one, let us know how it works! The Boring Company says it’ll start shipping the flamethrowers in the spring.
Follow Mike Wall on Twitter @michaeldwall and Google+ . Follow us @Spacedotcom , Facebook or Google+ . Originally published on Space.com .
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