Wind Factor in Fire Eating

Series Summary

A fire eater is an entertainer, often a street artist or someone who is part of a sideshow. The performer places flaming objects into their mouth and extinguishes them, as well as practicing controlling and transferring the flame. Other than fire safety precautions and some practical advice regarding the laws of physics, there are few secrets to eating fire. There is no such thing as "cold flames," and there isn't any special substance in the performer's mouth other than saliva.

So, you want to learn how to be a fire eater? Well, there's a few tips and techniques you might want to observe before partaking in the dangerous, yet impressive performance magic of fire eating. In this free video series, a fire eater will teach you how to take into account a number of variables that may affect fire eating, including the wind factor, heat factor, and type of torch being used. Further depths will also be explored, including how saliva and breathing should be used in fire eating, and how to eat fire safely. With these tips, and much more, you'll be well on your way to becoming a fire eating performer!

Video Transcript

"Fire eating. It goes way back. It's an ancient art. What would possess anybody to stick fire in their mouth? A paycheck perhaps. It is a great finish to a fire show, but when you see fire artists, either the finish is eating the fire or spewing the fire. We're not going to deal with spewing the fire today, we're simply going to deal with eating the fire. First and most important is, look at the fire to ask which way the wind is blowing. It's quite easy to tell because you look at the flame and it will go in the opposite direction of the wind. The wind is coming from this way and it's blowing that way. So I want to put my back to the wind. And now I can see my back is this way and the fire is that way. Do you think I should really eat it? What do you think? Well, rather than me eat it, I'll teach you how to eat it. It's simple physics. And here we go."