For a number of years, we have been initiating steam explosions of single drops of molten materials with pressure and flow (bubble growth) transients generated by discharging a capacitor bank through gold bridgewires placed underwater. Recent experimental and theoretical advances in the fieId of steam explosions, however, have made it important to substantially increase these relatively mild transients in water without using high explosives, if possible. To do this with the same capacitor bank, we have discharged similar energies through tiny strips of aluminum foil submerged in water. By replacing the gold wires with the aluminum strips, we were able to add the energy of the aluminum-water combustion to that normally deposited electrically by the bridgewire explosion in water.The chemical enhancement of the explosive characteristics of the discharges was substantial: when the same electrical energies were discharged through the aluminum strips, peak pressures increased as much as 12-foId and maximum bubble volumes as much as 5-fold above those generated with the gold wires. For given weights of aluminum, the magnitudes of both parameters appeared to exceed those produced by the underwater explosion of equivalent weights of high explosives.a Member of Technical Staff, Sandia National Laboratories, when this work was performed; current address,