No the most mysterious thing is was it pyrex.
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Seems that that tabletop was tempered or toughened glass. As it should have been for safety.
It is interesting that there is a difference between PYREX, and pyrex as trademarks. The former is for borosilicate heat resistant glass, and latter tempered normal soda lime glass.
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Sorry to read about your traumatic mishap. I recently bought a Pyrex baking dish, and the label advises always placing hot glassware on a dry, cloth potholder. Better luck next time.
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I have read the current Pyrex is not as good a old original Pyrex. Many years ago the Pyrex company changed hand, I think it is now made in China and is not as good as original Pyrex
We purchased a set of small glass bowls labelled as microwave storage containers. Supposedly made from heat resistant glass. After the second one cracked while in use in the microwave ruining the contents the rest went to the bin.
Buyer beware.
Is there a standard for oven proof or microwave safe products? How does a consumer obtain confidence a product is suitable or fit for purpose?
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Welcome to the Community @Davida
If you read through the prior posts you will see that they changed the type of glass used. Nothing to do with where it is manufactured.
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No, it is based on trust, apparently.
Fron CSIRO - However, as there are no standards currently available for claims such as ‘microwave-safe’, any concerns about the safety of such products should be referred to the manufacturer.
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Trial and error might be another way of looking at it.
For some materials the consequences of getting it wrong can be more than a few wasted dollars and a trip to the bin.
With a very heavy global manufacturing reliance on low cost products out of Asia, are the consumer risks unacceptable?
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Basic care to start with products labelled microwave safe. If it fails there should be a warranty and the ACL although neither cleans up the mess.
As with many products there is not always a direct relationship between price and quality.
which includes no-name brands that are dodgy rubbish as well as including some of the most exclusive high quality trusted ones in the market, right?
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No-name does not always equal dodgy rubbish, and brand names does not always assure quality. EG Dehumidifier fire risk?
Is ‘The Concern’ with Asia the lack of consumer transparency over the supply chain. Many brand names may have product out of the same Factory. Some brands go shopping for the cheapest factory/product to fill gaps in the product line. Reputation can only be a guide, for better or lesser?
Note: It’s more than product quality that gets questioned, as wages and working conditions are also topical.
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Our shower screen exploded for no apparent reason.
Ac my husband it can be from stress, perhaps from the hinges.
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Which screen? A door or a fixed wall panel?
A wall panel can explode when placed under stress through a house movement. House movement can occur through changing in ground conditions (drying and wetting cycles/subsidence or settling) or through changes in the building structure (from changes in temperature or moisture of the construction materials). This movement can place stress on a fixed panel until such point that the stress forces cause it to fail where it is weakest
If it was the door, it could be the hinges if there was corrosion or damage caused if the glass was drilled. Drilling causes microfractures around the drill hole which can become point of catastrophic failure due to a stress (change in temperature, corrosion, build-up of salts/solids between the hinge plate and glass and change in temperature causing stress etc).
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You should have got the upgraded husband without the hinges.
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But the old ones would break with change of temperature too. I still have some.
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Thank goodness I haven’t had anything quite so dangerous as this happen but I also grew up with Pyrex. Maybe they have remained old fashioned but I find if I put my Pyrex jugs in the dishwasher after a short amount of time I can no longer read the markings on it. Very disappointed.
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Because the markings are not embedded/enclosed in the glass and so the very alkaline washing powder/liquid quickly removes the exposed markings.
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Thanks I now understand. I’ll be hand washing them from now on 
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The glass panels are toughened glass, which is heat treated to provide a compressive stress in the outer layers. Any damage such as a crack or chip which penetrates this compressive layer will result in catastrophic failure of the whole sheet. This layer is usually less than 1mm thick.
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Pyrex is not what it used to be. It is a different material now. Before it used to be a low expansion glass, so when one part got cold while the rest was hot, the stress internally was low. When it did break such as dropping it, it was fracture into large chunks.
The modern glass is chemically different and made in a different way. It is either thermally or chemically modified to have a stressed outer layer so it will get highly stressed when cold and hot but is strong enough to tolerate the stress. However when it fails, it fails spectacularly. Sometimes the manufacturing process if poorly controlled produces uneven stress and spontaneous failure can occur.stress and
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I had a Pyrex jug explode while using a stick mixer in it, the type with a plastic foot, not metal.
We’ve noted subtle changes for the worse over the years including, at least for while, the raised print formally on the outside bottom being changed to the inside bottom which caused a spoon to grab the raised glass print while you were stirring. The thing that bugged me the most about Pyrex jugs is the graduations shown when held with your right hand is in ounces. I swapped to Decor now as I like how the graduations are printed and cast into the glass around the circumferance.
YouTubers named ‘The Slow Mo Guys’ have filmed Pyrex exploding on a few occasions. This one is about 5 years old shot at 343,000 frames per second, necessarily fast just to catch a few frames of the event: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xbuvcQrAOSk
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