NEWS

WIRES

OTHER

Fireworks Companies Working Around the Clock for July 4

This Independence Day, the 3-D cube will debut in Washington

Towns across the United States celebrate America's Independence Day on July 4 with fireworks - shimmering bursts of light that mesmerize and explosions so loud they rattle the chests of onlookers.

Since April, the fireworks display companies that put on the shows have been working at full tilt, according to Julie Heckman of the American Pyrotechnics Association. In many cases, the companies increase their number of employees tenfold in the weeks leading up to the holiday.

On the Fourth of July, the hard work pays off.

"You get dirty, sweaty, bloody, hot," said Lansden Hill, president of Pyro Shows USA, in LaFollette, Tennessee. "But at the end of the day, you flip a switch, and hundreds of thousands of people cheer and laugh and scream and honk horns. At that moment, there is not a job in the world like this."

Pyro Shows USA will entertain the nation's capital with a display that includes aerial shells that measure a little over 25 centimeters in diameter. The show's smallest shells, at roughly 15 centimeters across, are typically the largest used among fireworks shows worldwide, the company said.

Some 2,500 shells will be fired over Washington via electronic switches triggered by computers. The shells will travel 322 kilometers per hour before bursting. Washington's fireworks will comprise 6,350 kilograms of gun powder, more than any show in the country, Hill said.

In the last dozen years, Pyro has put on half of the July Fourth fireworks displays in Washington. Hill said that, since his first Washington show in 1995, the chemicals in fireworks have improved, the workmanship is better, the explosions are more easily scripted using computers and "human ingenuity continues to think of new things to do." Like other fireworks executives, Hill spends part of each year traveling the world to seek out the best products, finding most of them in factories in China.

In 1995, the only patterned shell - a firework that goes up and explodes into a recognizable shape - was the "Saturn-ring shell," Hill said. It burst to form a spherical ball with one ring around it, like the planet. But, today, shells explode into the shapes of hearts, stars, smiley faces and sunflowers.

This year "the cube" will debut in Washington. The shell explodes to look like the three-dimensional see-through box that school children learn to draw in beginning art classes.

There will be more colors this year - among them lemons, limes, peaches, oranges, fuchsias and deep purples.

Jim Souza - president of Pyro Spectaculars Inc., in Rialto, California, the company that will set off fireworks in Boston and New York for the Fourth - said that in terms of size and sophistication, fireworks shows in the United States are beyond compare. For instance, the New York Fourth of July show will be launched from more (six) and larger (15.24 meters wide by 91-182 meters long) barges than is typical in international shows, including the Hong Kong Harbor fireworks for Chinese New Year.

Souza said fireworks in major U.S. cities are designed to thrill both live audiences and television audiences: Fireworks in New York will be choreographed to fill a high-definition, oversized television screen. Three tiers of bursts will fill the sky after being fired from multiple locations.

But Does The Business Boom?

While the number of fireworks shows increased markedly after the bicentennial of the United States' independence in 1976, business has been stung recently by high costs due to new safety regulations and due to higher fuel prices, said a spokeswoman for the American Pyrotechnics Association.

Transportation costs are a big part of the business. The 10 largest companies each manage hundreds of fireworks shows on the Fourth of July. Souza said his company will run more than 400 shows in cities across the United States on the Fourth of July.

Just as retailers live for Christmas Eve, fireworks companies live for the Fourth, Hill said. "It makes or breaks your business." While U.S. fireworks-display companies do business year-round, Hill said that as much as 50 percent of his company's annual sales will come the week of July Fourth.

Hill admits that the National Park Service, which negotiates the contract for the Washington show, drives a tough bargain because the national fireworks show is one that companies want to put on their resumes.

Hill said he will accept lower profits because it is a thrill to "perform" Washington. (He uses the language of show business and says he even gets stage fright before each fireworks show.)

"As an American, I can't think of any show you can do that gives you a greater sense of pride than to do the national show," he said. "This is the show that is performed at our nation's capital in honor of everything that our country stands for - it's a very humbling experience."

See also "U.S. Independence Day a Civic and Social Event."

Source: U.S. Department of State

judythpiazza@newsblaze.com