The ingenious engineer Mark Rober was approached by talk show host Jimmy Kimmel to build a giant T-shirt cannon for Kimmel’s LA Bowl at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California. Rober enlisted the help of 12 year old Anthony Hartman, the young genius inventor in Illinois who built a respirator out of LEGO bricks.
I was challenged to build a T-Shirt cannon. I accepted the challenge.
The two collaborated with ideas via video chat. Rober did the testing while Hartman helped with the design. Hartman even built a miniature version of the canon so as to ensure both caliber and safety. When Rober finally reached a successful test launch, he wanted it to make sure it was absolutely perfect for Hartman.
We literally just hit the back of the seat of the very top row in the entire arena and that perfectly accomplished our objective down to a few inches, which was a huge weight off my shoulders because i felt like we were locked on Anthony’s design. And I remember my first experiences with engineering and i really wanted this to be a grand slam for him.
Hartman and his family were at the game when Rober told Hartman that he would be joining them for the launch during halftime.
You know that cannon we’ve been designing? We designed it for this game and at halftime you’re going to go out with me and Jimmy Kimmel and we’re gonna fire it in front of 50,000 people.
The launch went perfectly, albeit it was shot right out of the park.
