Ex-NASA Engineer Exacts High Tech, Glittery, Grand Revenge On Porch Pirates

Engineer Mark Rober designed an elaborate revenge package that turns
porch pirates' lives into a glittery, stinky mess 

Tis the season for porch pirates.

You know, they are the legions of creeps and idiots out there who see packages delivered to porches, doorsteps and whatnot and help themselves to them.

It's a huge problem, and everybody who has victimized has revenge fantasies against the porch pirates.

Who doesn't love that surveillance camera footage of a porch pirate running off with a package, slipping on the home's muddy lawn, and painfully falling and breaking her leg. 

I'm guessing none of these revenge fantasies is extensive as the one a guy named Mark Rober had.

He's a former NASA engineer who worked on the Curiosity rover, which explored Mars a few years back. So Rober knows how to design stuff.

Rober took design to a whole new level to combat porch pirates. Or at least make them pay.

He spent six months designing a package that, when opened by thieves, causes a big explosion of very fine glitter that gets all over and into everything.  The glitter is so extensive that it will make a permanent part of the porch pirates' home or car, wherever they opened the package

Rober's bait package also emits repeated mists of fart spray. Really!

A view of Rober's glitter bomb exploding. 

Plus, it's designed with cameras that start recording when the package is stolen, and captures the reaction of the thieves in all their glitter-covered glory.  The viral video you'll see below is a bit long and involved, but it's certainly worth watching the whole thing.

There is a segment in the middle of the video that shows a slow motion view of when the glitter explodes. It's really quite pretty. I don't know what the porch pirates are complaining about in the video.

It's interesting to watch all the contigencies and design elements he put into this package, which gives you a window into how smart engineers work. Then, toward the end, we see the glitter explosions after the porch pirates have stolen these boxes.

I wonder if it will make these people rethink their line of work. I don't know that it will, but it certainly makes their "job" more complicated. Here's the video: