New York Looks To Make Elon Musk’s Flamethrowers Illegal

Boring Company Flamethrower

You may recall, in one of the many adventures of Elon Musk, that last year he began taking pre-orders for a flamethrower created by his ‘Boring Company’. The product (following the release of a few videos) proved to be hugely popular with all 20,000 units being purchased. They have since now all been distributed to their respective owners around the world.

As you might expect, however, such a product has raised a number of concerns. For example, an owner in the UK was recently visited by the police due to his purchase.

In a report via CNET, however, there may be an official challenge to their legality. Why? Well, lawmakers in New York want to introduce a law that would effectively make their ownership illegal.

What’s The Problem?

Lawmakers in New York have proposed the banning of such devices as they feel they propose a significant risk to the public. Presumably more so than, let’s say, an assault rifle. In a statement, they have said:

“Elon Musk’s Boring Company released a new flamethrower which sold out of all 20,000 within days, without any concern to the training of the purchasers or their reasons for buying. Allowing the general public to access this type of machine is extremely problematic.”

This isn’t the first time that a legal challenge has been issued against them in America. The law proposal, however, would look to make their ownership a ‘Class E’ Felony which would come with a 4-year prison sentence.

What Do We Think?

At the risk of opening up the gun control can of worms, this just seems entirely ridiculous. There are, quite frankly, much bigger problems than 20,000 Boring Company flamethrowers in the world and I daresay that some of their critics are disappointed that there hasn’t, to date, been an incident involving any of them.

I’ll admit, I thought the product was somewhat questionable. At the same time, however, it’s hard to deny that it’s also pretty awesome! Would I own one? Yes. Would I be confidence that I’d always be able to (legally) keep it? No.

In this instance, however, I wouldn’t be too concerned. As above, I suspect that a specific ban on ‘flamethrowers’ would ironically cause much bigger problems for gun control laws in general. It does, however, seem clear that some people are very adamant that, at the very least, they don’t want such products to turn into a trend.

What do you think? – Let us know in the comments!