I wonder who printed (broadcast) that government regs shut them down?
Defending
42 product liability lawsuits to people who got burned bankrupted them.
Google returns several articles describing Blitz cans exploding without proximity to fire from static electricity alone, causing major injury. For example a small girl burned to death where it first appeared that her father doused her with gasoline and set her on fire. The article by Dan Rather (
pdf) is interesting. He reports that ATF testing related to prosecuting that father showed a Blitz can exploded 13 times in 17 tests, so charges were dismissed. Blitz repeated the tests and the can exploded in three of their four tests.
It looks to me that static electricity around gasoline is just as much a risk as the blatant misuse that we thought was the problem.