Dustin Sandlin produces and hosts the popular YouTube series called Smarter Every Day. He’s literally a rocket engineer who began producing educational videos (think awesome science experiments) in 2007.

His YouTube channel has 11.1M subscribers, so it should be no surprise to learn his videos have a lot of views. Even so, some of his content is far more popular than others; case in point, the 35-minute video below, which has nearly 13M views since being posted only 10 days ago. 

As Dustin explains, he’s attempting to fuse two bullets together in flight. The motivation for this project came from seeing two soft-lead bullets (minie balls) that were discovered fused together on a Civil War battlefield. The battle took place in Fredericksburg, Virginia, in December 1862.

Of course, the odds of two bullets impacting each other so perfectly is beyond comprehension or calculation. And as you watch Dustin and his very smart engineer friends attempt to duplicate the bullet-to-bullet collision and fusing of lead — under controlled conditions — you get an even greater understanding of this impossible real-life shot.

Note: I highly recommend you watch the entire 35 minutes, but if you want a tease, then fast-forward to the 21:51 mark, where you’ll see two bullets freeze in the air after impact. It’s insanely cool. (The first collision occurs at 12:40, and it gets only better, and more interesting,  from there.)

Many people who have subscribed to Dustin’s channel for a decade or more think this video is the best one he’s ever produced. I haven’t watched all of his content, but it’s certainly my favorite. Check it out

P.S. I can’t wait to see a follow-up video where Dustin and his friends tweak the bullet lead recipe to hopefully duplicate the Civil War fusion result.