Science
- Mark Rober, a former NASA engineer, built a hi-tech glitter bomb prank to catch out parcel thieves.
- Rober's parcel was stolen in May by "porch pirates" and police didn't help, so he devised a solution himself.
- The glitter bomb is hidden in an Apple HomePod speaker box, and the explosion is recorded using four hidden smartphones inside.
- Rober placed the fake speaker on his porch several times, and captured the reactions when people are showered in glitter and novelty fart spray.
A former NASA engineer made an explosive glitter bomb to ward off parcel thieves after he had a parcel stolen from his porch earlier this year.
Mark Rober, who worked for NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory for nine years, said in a Monday YouTube video that he spent six months building a "glitter bomb revenge package" after someone stole a parcel from his own porch this May.
Police at the time told him there wasn't much they could do about it, he said.
Nearly 30% of Americans say they've had delivery orders gone missing or been stolen, according to a survey by Xfinity Home.
Here's how the high-tech prank works.
The glitter bomb is hidden inside the packaging of an Apple HomePod speaker, which is wrapped in clear cellophane and left on a person's porch.
But instead of the speaker inside the box, there are four concealed smartphones which record the would-be thief from every angle, through hidden windows cut into the outside of the box.
The package also has an in-built GPS locator and accelerometer, prompt the phones to start recording if the box is moved.
As a tribute to the "Home Alone" prankster Kevin McCallister, the character played by Macaulay Culkin, Rober put postage stickers on the package which were addressed to Harry and Marv, the movie's slapstick crooks.
As the thief opens the package, wires are tripped which cause the motor inside to start spinning, covering those nearby in glitter.
There's no way to tell whether the person opening the packing is the rightful owner or not, which means the product would be of limited use in the real world.
To add insult to injury, the 38-year-old also added a "fart spray" dispenser to the prank.
When the box is opened, a canister sprays the foul-smelling synthetic "fart spray" out the top of the box. In the video Rober says: "No joke you can clear a room with one spray of this."
Rober said in his video: "If anyone was going to make a revenge package and over-engineer the crap out of it, it was going to be me."
"The moral of the story is just don't take other people's stuff," he said.
Here's the full video: