"Somebody get Tedward in here to discuss the safety aspects of it all. Safety third, kids. "

Tedward has been paged.

Okay, colored fire spinning is dangerous in about 100 ways. The top few are:
1) The metal salts do not dissolve in standard alkane petro-chems, so white gas and lamp oil are out. You MUST use a polar solvent like water alcohol, MEK, etc.
2) For the very best color, the solvent with the fewest carbon atoms must be used: Methanol. Methanol works like ethanol: gets you drunk, changes your judgement, hangovers, etc. However, it can do so through inhalation and skin absorption; PLUS once it's in your blood it turns to formic acid and starts attacking your nervous system. First one down... vision.
3) Ethanol in 90%+ is very hard to find, doesn't work as well, but is popular in "denatured" form. The "denaturing" process usually involves adding 4 to 50% Methanol plus a thiol to make it taste bad. It, too can make you drunk through unexpected vectors.
4) Some of the salts are fairly innocuous, but the most popular green comes from boric acid. Screwing up the mix on this will result in Kevlar, brass, steel and some grades of aluminum getting eaten entirely through.
5) The best salts, of course, are restricted materials: Lithium chloride (for treatment of depression), Strontium chloride (slightly radioactive), etc.
6) Regardless of the combination of fuels and salts, about 1% of the population is highly sensitive to exposure to the waste products. Symptoms include blindness (temp), respiratory failure, extreme rash, skin eruptions, allergic reactions, discoloration, and death.
7) Many formulas do not leave the tool. It's often impossible to use one tool for many colors as residual color burns will continue for the life of the tool, with the same potential for side effects.
-=>Ask your physician if using "Colored Fuels" is right for you <=-

;)

Naturally a fast burning metal such as magnesium would work better. That is not the issue. What "sounds" better if you are trying to lure someone into a prank? The fear factor of spent uranium is much greater than that of magnesium.

And there's Hanford, not all that far away in Washington state......and there's Sandia in New Mexico........

Good friggin' grief.

I suppose some of the geniuses here could tell you how much paperwork is involved in the inspection, transfer, use, and disposal of nuclear (read 'radioactive') materials, especially in the medical field. Also the construction inspection field (they have nuclear moisture-density gauges that are used, for instance, to achieve the optimal state of moisture in a subgrade under a highway pavement that use Americium-131.) It's so damn easy to put together a conspiracy theory out west or a fictitional 'dirty bomb' plot that it's crazy.

I'll say this only once: Spent uranium or any other spent nuclear fuel was never used to start the Man on fire. Ever. I don't think the BMOrg knows the safety precautions, protocols, inspections, or protections that go with the use of radioactive material. And I don't think they ever will need to.