No, not those kind of Zombies.

In the previous volume we looked at power tools, slings/arrows and firearms. In this volume we will cover explosives, fire, chemical/biological warfare, electrocution and radiation.

This is the final volume in “How to kill a Zombie”.

 

Explosives


Question: What could be better than hurling a hand grenade at a mass of approaching Zombies? Answer: almost anything. Anti-personnel explosives kill mainly by shrapnel, metal shards tearing through vital organs. As this will not affect Zombies, and the chance of shrapnel penetrating the skull is slim, grenades, bombs, and other explosive tools are inefficient weapons.

These devices should not be completely discounted, though. For blasting through doors, creating instant barricades, or even scattering Zombie mobs, nothing works better than a jar of gunpowder.

 

Fire

The living dead have no fear of fire. Waving an open flame in a ghoul’s face will do nothing to slow or impede its advance. Zombies who have caught fire will neither notice nor react to the engulfing flames in any way. Too many humans have met with tragedy for failing to understand that fire is no deterrent to Zombies!

As a weapon, however, fire is still humanity’s greatest ally. Complete incineration is the best way to destroy a Zombie once and for all. Burning eliminated not only the body but all traces of the Zombie virus. However, don’t think a flamethrower and several Molotov cocktails are the solution to all your problems. In actual combat, fire can be as deadly a threat as it is a protector.

Flesh – human, undead or otherwise – takes a long time to burn. In the minutes of hours before a blazing Zombie succumbs, it will become a walking – or to be perfectly accurate, a shambling – torch. Several cases have been recorded in which burning ghouls have done more damage, even caused more deaths, than they would have with only their fingernails and teeth.

Fire itself has no loyalty. Consider the flammable nature of your surroundings, the chance of smoke inhalation, the possibility that a blaze will act as a beacon for other Zombies. All these factors must be considered before such a powerful and unpredictable weapon is unleashed. For this reason, fire is mainly considered an attack or flight weapon, and rarely used for static defence.

1. Molotov Cocktails

This term applies to any jar of flammable liquid with a primitive fuse. It is a cheap, effective way to kill multiple Zombies at once. If the situation permits – e.g., fleeing an advancing horde, clearing a fireproof structure, or destroying a flammable structure with multiple Zombies trapped in it – by all means, bombard the ghouls in question until nothing is left but ash.

2. Dousing

The act of dousing consists of simply filling a bucket with flammable liquid (gasoline, kerosene, etc.), throwing it at a Zombie or Zombies, lighting a match, and running. If there is room for escape and no danger of residual fire damage, the only drawback to this method is the close proximity required to fully drench the enemy.

3. Blowtorch

The common torch, which consists of a propane tank attached to a nozzle, has neither the heating power nor the fuel supply to burn through a Zombie skull. But it can be a convenient firestarter if the undead in question have already been soaked in a flammable liquid.

4. The Flamethrower

This weapon, perhaps more than any other, strikes people as the ultimate Zombie eliminator. A jet of flame, two hundred feet long, composed of jellied gasoline, can turn and undead crowd into a wailing funeral pyre. So why not acquire one? Why not forsake all other weapons for this man-made fire-breathing dragon? The answers are as realistic as they are numerous. The flamethrower as developed purely as a military weapon and is no longer in services with the U.S. Army and Marine Corps. It would be difficult to find any model, let alone one that works properly. Acquiring the fuel is even more difficult than the thrower. But assuming you can find both, you must consider its practical use. Why carry seventy pounds of equipment on your back when only a handful of ghouls are loose? A flamethrower’s weight makes it a liability if you are on the move. Unless you are in a fixed position or have access to motorized transport, sheer exhaustion will become as dangerous a threat as the walking dead. Common sense would suggest that a flamethrower’s place on the battlefield is against overwhelming numbers, swarms of undead numbering in the hundreds if not thousands. If such a horde were, heaven forbid, to exist, chances are they would be facing a much larger, well-equipped government force rather than the one private civilian and his trusty (and lets not forget illegal) flamethrower.

 

Other weapons

Imagination and improvisation are two invaluable assets during clashes with the living dead. By all means, feel free to regard all the materials around you as a cache of potential weapons. But always keep in mind a Zombie’s physiology, and what your homemade device is likely to accomplish.

Chemical Warfare

1. Acid

Apart from fire, sulphuric acid is the best way to completely destroy a Zombie. Implementing it is another matter. If somehow you have the means to acquire or produce large amounts of sulphuric acid, treat it with the same respect you would an incendiary weapon. Not only is this substance as much a danger to yourself as it is to the undead, the time it takes to dissolve Zombie flesh and bone is considerable. Acid should be used as a post-encounter disposal tool rather than a combat weapon.

2. Poison

As there are hundreds of thousands of lethal compounds in this world, it is impossible to discuss them all. Instead, I shall review some of the basic rules that govern the physical and physiological makeup of the undead. Zombies are immune to all types of tranquilizers and irritants such as Mace and tear gas. Any compound designed to halt bodily functions would be equally impotent, as the undead no longer require these functions. Zombies do not suffer from heart attacks, nerve paralysis, suffocation, or any other fatal effects caused by poison.

3. Biological Warfare

Wouldn’t it be poetic to destroy beings infected by a virus with another virus? Unfortunately, this is not an option. Viruses attack only living cells. They have no effect on the dead. The same is true for all types of bacteria. Several laboratory attempts have been made to culture and spread necrotizing facsiitis (a flesh-eating bacterial disease) among captured Zombies. None have proved successful.

4. Electrocution

As the Zombie’s muscular system is basically that of a human, electricity does have the ability to temporarily stun or paralyze its body. Lethal results have been seen only in extreme cases such as power lines used to completely char a Zombie’s brain. This is not a “wonder weapon” – the current that runs through power lines is enough to burn almost any organic matter, living or undead, to a crisp. It requires twice the voltage to stun  Zombie that it does to stun a human, so common taser guns are ineffective. Electricity has been used to create a temporary barrier with water-filled, electrified ditches to keep ghouls paralyzed long enough for a secondary fatal method to be employed. Several such incidents have been recorded over the years.

5. Radiation

Experiments are now being conducted to test the effects of microwaves and other electromagnetic signals on the brains of the undead, on the theory that such a device could generate massive, instant, lethal tumours in a Zombie’s grey matter. Research is still in its early stages, and results have so far been inconclusive. During the only known instance when Zombies came into contact with gamma radiation, ghouls were not only unaffected by radiation that would have killed humans, but they threatened to spread their contamination throughout the province. For the first time, the world glimpsed a new and even deadlier threat: the radioactive Zombie. As much as this sounds like the product of bad 1950s science fiction, it is, or was, a very real and historically significant face. According to records, the radioactive ghouls possessed lay no enhanced abilities or magical powers. The threat they posed lay in the ability to spread deadly radiation to everything and everyone they touched. Even people who drank from a water supply the ghouls had touched died soon afterward from radiation sickness. Fortunately, the outbreak was crushed by the overwhelming power of the Chinese army.

 

This is the final volume in “How to kill a Zombie”.