You need 3 things for a fire (explosion is just very fast burning)
Fuel + Oxygen + spark
The more you add of one thing, the less you need of the others to make fire happen.
The more flammable something, the less oxygen and spark you need (think gasoline vs wood, it takes more effort to get wood to burn)
The more oxygen you have, the easier it is to get stuff to burn. That’s why welding with oxygen often has flames on the steel.
And the more “spark” you have, the easier it is to get stuff ignited. The spark from an airplane is enough to get an office fire going which is enough to weaken steel beams to the point of crashing a skyscraper to the ground.
Also, the point of a wick is to focus the spark to make only one particular spot burn, which reduces the amount of energy needed to get the fire started.
Bonus fact. Explosives such as gunpowder contain stuff like Nitrate which already has oxygen in it, so it has more. That’s why it explodes, it has a lot of oxygen without being exposed to the air.
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