Putting on the show
Behind the scenes of the Fourth of July fireworks

Fireworks explode over Durango in this file shot. Durango firefighters will detonate 3,200 colorful “effects,” as they are called, over the town this Friday starting at dusk. The entire display involves the work of six “shooters,” 20 or 30 volunteer firefighters, an ambulance and eight to 10 fire trucks./Photo by David Halterman

by Jeff Mannix

At approximately 9:15 p.m. on July 4, as night descends over Durango, dogs will begin disappearing, babies will start to cry, and a collective “Aaah” will issue forth from thousands gazing intently skyward. This Friday, the dark skies over Durango will explode with pyrotechnics in celebration of Independence Day, when, on July 4, 1776, the Second Continental Congress declared that the 13 colonies of North America were “free and independent states” and that “all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is and ought to be totally dissolved.”And Durango is cutting no corners for this year’s celebration.

“We’ll have 3,200 effects in the air this Independence Day,” reports Tom Kaufman, fire marshal of the Durango Fire & Rescue Authority. “We’ll have six shooters, 20 or 30 volunteer firefighters, an ambulance and eight to 10 fire trucks on hand.”

The cost of Durango’s fireworks display is now borne by the City of Durango, after years of maneuvering by a volunteer committee headed by Chuck Norton, which squeezed money out of downtown businesses
and put on the first Fourth of July shindig at Santa Rita Park in 1991, selling hot dogs, soda pop and working the crowd with donation cans.

The aerial effects will be staged on the hill next to Greenmount Cemetery, above the Doubletree Hotel, and will last for approximately 30 minutes. As always, the display will be coordinated with patriotic music that can be heard on Fort Lewis College radio station KDUR, found on the FM dial at 91.1 and 93.9, or streamed online at kdur.org. “We have a volunteer DJ on the hill who brings enormous loud speakers that all the shooters can hear to choreograph their detonations; it’s a great event, and the music makes it a fun challenge for the crew,” says Kaufman.

As American as they’ve become, fireworks are believed to have been invented 2,000 years ago in China, concocted accidentally when a cook heated three ingredients – salt peter, charcoal and sulfur. When reduced to a black powder, the mixture was found to spark and explode when it came in contact with fire. The first work was a hollow bamboo stick stuffed with this black powder and thrown into a fire. Venetian trader and explorer Marco Polo brought some of these “fire sticks” back to Italy in the mid-13th century. The Italians are credited with developing fireworks into a true art form with aerial shells, and it wasn’t until the mid-19th century that the colors of red, green and blue were introduced into the black powder mixture.

Durango Fire & Rescue Marshal Tom Kaufman shows off one of the pyrotechnics that will fill Durango’s sky this Friday. The biggest effects measure 12 inches and weigh in at 40 pounds. Although the annual display used to include 18-inchers, they have since been outlawed by Homeland Security./Photo by Max Norman

Durango Fire & Rescue has been at the fireworks game long enough now to have all the necessary equipment stored on trailers and all six shooters trained and familiar with the routine. “The shooters are the same guys every year, and they’ve been trained and licensed to handle Class A pyrotechnics,” Kaufman explains. “It’s a very dangerous job, and they light the fuses with what we call a ‘fusee,’ which is a 20-minute road flare. Then they have less than seven seconds to turn away and protect themselves from the concussion and hot debris. There’s no time to run.”

The aerial effects are placed into plastic or thick cardboard tubes, appropriately called mortars, and are arranged in rows on racks affixed to the ground. The actual fireworks come in sizes of 3, 5, 6, 10 and 12 inches long, are spherical in shape and wrapped in what appears to be rice paper. “The 18-inch effects are no longer allowed by Homeland Security, but when we used them they would reach 2,400 feet above the ground and have a bursting radius of 1,600 feet,” says Kaufman. “They were truly a bomb, but spectacular. Our largest now are 12 inches, and they are the size of a basketball, weigh close to 40 pounds and are placed in a mortar that’s buried into the ground 5 feet.”

Pyrotechnics have kept pace with digital and electronic technology, and big shows are coordinated by computer to the tempo of music, electronically adjusting to the time the effects take to ignite, reach their altitude and detonate. “We don’t have the money to computerize the fireworks show,” says Fire Chief Dan Noonan, “but we hope to have funds donated and look forward to reaching that level of sophistication in the future.”

But this year Durango Fire & Rescue does have an electronic firing unit that coordinates 96 leads that can fire multiple effects and be rewired quickly.

“I’ll be operating the electronic firing unit,” says Dave Imming, of Durango Fire & Rescue. “I have gone through pretty extensive training to use this equipment, and I’ll be up on the hill by 2 in the afternoon, setting it up and connecting all the cables. It’s a pretty big and complicated job, but it makes it safer for all of us because from 100 or more feet away, I launch all the effects larger than 6 inches.”

A 6-inch aerial effect is the size of a hand grenade. All the effects have two stages: a lift charge that launches the bundle to a calculated altitude, then a break charge that bursts it open and ignites the various effects within. The bigger the bundle, the more effects. The most dangerous is called a “salute” and contains titanium that makes the big flash and bang.

“We’re most concerned with what we call the ‘short shell,’” says Kaufman. “They are the effects that for some reason don’t come out of the mortar or come out only a short distance and turn back down. And if a short shell is a titanium salute … well, that’s why our shooters are in full bunker gear with hearing and full face protection.”

The City of Durango, in association with Kiwanis and Rotary, are filling the nation’s birthday celebration with daylong family activities beginning with a pancake breakfast from 7:30 to 10:30 a.m. at Rotary Park; a Freedom Run starting at 9 a.m. at Rotary Park; then a full day of entertainment, including a reading of the Declaration of Independence, at Buckley Park; a parade down Main at 6 p.m. followed by a street dance from 6:30 to 9 p.m., ending with the first aerial burst. More information on the festivities can be found on page 20.

“There were 1,100 fires started by fireworks last year in Colorado,” cautions Kaufman. “So, I’d like to encourage everyone to come downtown or go to Rim Drive up at the college to view our spectacular display and leave the fireworks to us. Let’s all have a fun-filled Fourth of July; fireworks are very, very dangerous.” •