Hard Drive Destruction
Death By Gasoline
Our first experiment was to see exactly how much damage a hard drive would take by being burned in a gasoline fire.
Preparation
 |
 |
 |
Our ingredients were fairly simple: one hard drive, a decent side metal bowl, and enough gasoline to soak the drive completely.
 |
 |
We trailed a bit of toilet paper from the bowl and set that on fire for "safety."
Burnin!
 |
 |
It burns good :)
 |
|
Mental note: Water-based fire extinguishers don't really help to put out chemical fires. Our friendly campus police were able to provide a class-B CO2 based fire extinguisher to help us put it out. At this point the hard drive looked pretty much intact, it didn't even seem singed!
Results & Disassembly
 |
 |
|
After being cleaned the drive was expectedly burned on the outside. Upon opening, however, it looked nearly perfect. If there was actually data on the drive it may have been corrupted, but this obviously would not be the best form of data destruction against international superspys.
Destruction Score (Out of 5)
