PENTAERYTHRITOL is a component of the plastic explosive (Semtex-H) used to destroy a commercial jet (Pan Am Flight 103) near Lockerbie, Scotland in 1988. Pentaerythritol explosive was used by the so-called shoe bomber Richard Reid, who attempted to blow up an American Airlines flight between Paris, France, and Miami, Florida, in December 2001. The would-be assassin of Saudi Arabia's Prince Mohammed bin Nayef hid his bomb in his underwear, apparently believing that cultural taboos would prevent a search in that part of his body. Several news reports said the assailant hid the bomb inside his rectum, but the Saudi government discounted those reports. The prince was slightly injured when the bomb exploded in the August 2009 attack. The Saudis said they think the bomb weighed 100 grams.

PETN is used in Detonating Cord of which it is the explosive core (Primacord), where it develops a velocity rate of 21,000 feet per second. Detonating cord is insensitive to friction and ordinary shock, but may be exploded by rifle fire. It also detonates sympathetically with the detonation of an adjacent high explosive. Hot spots, formed by shock interaction with voids or defects in explosives, control the onset of detonation; although many mechanisms have been postulated and modeled, the actual mechanism(s) are unknown.

PENTAERYTHRITOL is used as a priming composition in detonators, a base charge in blasting caps, and a core load for detonating fuse. PENTAERYTHRITOL is one of the strongest known high explosives with a relative effectiveness factor (R.E. factor) of 1.66. It is more sensitive to shock or friction than TNT or tetryl, and it is never used alone as a booster. It is primarily used in booster and bursting charges of small caliber ammunition, in upper charges of detonators in some land mines and shells, and as the explosive core of primacord. Pentaerythritol can be classified as pentaerythritol 98% ,pentaerythritol 95%