I did military engineering for some time so we worked with a lot of Titanium, but when machining it we were always told to remove scraps ASAP and bag them up because if a single spark from a welding torch got on the pile then it would go up in flames and can even explode. To demonstrate this the instructor got a pile of titanium shavings and lit them on fire. We were never instructed why this happens and googling it I could only find stuff about titanium powder in pure oxygen or the melting point of titanium.
In: Physics
Most metals react with oxygen. In some cases, this is relatively slow (e.g. rust), but in the right conditions and with the right metals the reaction can happen extremely quickly.
Titanium is one such metal. It takes a fair bit of energy to ignite it, but **if** it goes up it burns extremely hot, and if a lot of titanium shavings or dust (i.e. a lot of surface area, and a lot of room for oxygen molecules to flow between the metal particles) go up it can burn or explode pretty spectacularly.
Another case of metal oxidation is aluminum, hence why aluminum powder was actually used as a propellant for the solid rocket boosters on the Space Shuttle.
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