Author Spotlight
Francesca Stamati
“FIRE IN THE HOLE!”
Under 1,000 feet of impenetrable limestone, senior Sean Holland triggered a one-megajoule blast that pressed against his back like a gust of wind — all with the click of a button. Ears ringing from the reverb, Ryan — his twin brother — grinned at Sean from across the cavern.
Can we do it again?
It wasn’t just dynamite the boys got to play with last summer at Explosives Camp in Rolla, Mo. For five days, the Hollands participated in hands-on labs at Missouri S&T college with commercial mining engineers and eight other students, analyzing parts of mechanical explosives — the primers, the fuse, the debt chord.
Since the summer, the boys can’t stop thinking about their future in mining engineering — especially after committing to Missouri S&T for college. Even in AP Calculus BC, when they’re opening their heavy duty TI-89 calculators — recommended by their camp professor — their thoughts go straight to the mines and the thrill of their future career.
“Explosives camp was the starting point for all of this,” Sean said. “The detonation.”
The camp’s focus? Blowing up as much stuff as possible.
Triggering 15-20 blasts a day — while wearing white hard hats and safety goggles, of course — the boys engaged in labs testing different types of explosives. They played with everything from dynamite sticks to TNT boxes, pushing the detonator just like cartoon characters they watched as kids.
After a slew of labs and laughs with their professor — a mining engineer and former host of the Discovery Channel documentary series, “The Detonators” — the twins applied to Missouri S&T and were accepted in June. They loved the small-town community and shared their professor’s delight watching steel pipes burst into flames. It didn’t hurt that S&T is one of only three colleges in the country with a test mine for them to… experiment.
They like that about science — the playfulness. They were always curious growing up, according to their mom Kelley James. She saw their grins widen after winning Mathletics competitions and while huddled under blankets binging “How It’s Made” and “Impossible Engineering” on Science Channel late at night as kids.
She knew one day they’d pick a collaborative career like mining — after all, they’d always challenged each other. She remembers a project from one of their engineering courses for Project Lead The Way — the STEM-based curriculum they’ve been enrolled in since freshman year. Over the pandemic, the boys had to construct a maze for a Ping Pong ball to roll through using household items.
“They had to make sure they had the biggest and best and most complicated maze,” Kelley said. “It took over our entire kitchen. They used everything in our house from recyclables to things out of the kitchen to tools from the garage. It was awesome.”
At engineering camp, they got to apply their creativity to the mines while previewing labs they’ll do in college. During one test, they built their own explosive by filling an empty wine bottle with C-4 explosive putty. Holding the tiny granules that would produce a deafening boom and demolish steel beams, the boys were reminded of childhood playtime.
“C-4 feels like Kinetic Sand,” the Hollands said.
Despite the fun they have, the twins know the mines are no place to mess around — there’s zero tolerance for mistakes in engineering. In their future careers, either as mining planners or managers, they know their calculations and plans will have to be precise. Mining takes focus and respect for the craft — something they learned at camp and through their engineering courses.
Still, they can’t deny the adrenaline rush of embedding a bomb in limestone then gunning it for two miles on an ATV to outrun the blast.
“It felt like someone was grabbing all of your organs and shaking you back and forth,” Ryan said.
The thill is a feeling both know they’ll never get tired of. Sick of hours of note-taking in high school, both Ryan and Sean wanted something more stimulating — like a day job working with million-dollar explosives, zooming up and down the mine’s elevator shaft and peering down dark caverns with their head lamps. After watching them grow up wrestling each other and spending their energy on basketball and soccer, their mom knew mining engineering would combine their love of STEM with their itch to stay engaged.
“There’s no point in a mining career where you have to be sitting down,” Ryan said. “There’s always stuff you can do up on your feet.”
Ryan and Sean didn’t expect that they both would want to spend the rest of their lives cradling explosives in pitch black commercial mines. But no one is surprised. The twins take the same AP Computer Science Principles, AP Calculus BC and AP Chemistry 2 classes, and are in the same CAA engineering courses. Their schedules and interests are as similar as their faces.
“It’s been 18 years, and I can’t think of more than five things we’ve disagreed on,” Ryan said.
While the Hollands are eager to get back into the mines, they haven’t explored their future career much since the camp. Instead, they’re focused on learning math and physics to prepare for the five required math courses they’ll take at Missouri S&T. They’ll leave the detonator tests for college.
“You can’t really recreationally practice exploding stuff,” Sean said.
But when they get home from school, glancing at the collection of exploded blasting caps on a shelf in their bedroom, they remember the feeling of sound waves moving through them after a detonation. It blew them away — and into their dream career path.
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