With the annual Honda Celebration of Light set to launch tomorrow night, preparations on the barge in English Bay are well under way.
Hundreds of thousands of people are expected to descend on Vancouver’s West End for the annual fireworks extravaganza July 29, Aug. 2 and Aug. 5. Teams of fireworks professionals from Japan, the United Kingdom and Canada have been challenged to interpret hits from Canadian music icons The Tragically Hip, Leonard Cohen and Bryan Adams.
Â鶹´«Ă˝Ół»police said crowd size fluctuates from night to night but the department has plans in place to deal with up to half a million people. Last year, police were caught off guard by the number of people who came out for the final night.
“As a result this year we have adjusted our plans accordingly to make sure we’re able to have people enter and leave safely,” said Supt. Michelle Davies.
In an effort to spread the crowd out a bit, some of the pre-festival activities, including musical performances and kids’ activities, have been moved to Second Beach. The fireworks show will be also visible from Second Beach, with a partially obstructed view.
“We’re also encouraging people to come down a little earlier as part of the ability to manage crowds, to filter them through throughout the afternoon,” said Paul Tilbury, co-chair of the Â鶹´«Ă˝Ół»Fireworks Festival Society.
Once the show is over and the crowds have disbursed, “a small army” comes in to start cleaning up, said Albert Shamess, Vancouver’s director of zero waste and resource recovery. He said the city will have 200 extra garbage cans out for the event and encouraged the public to use reusable containers as much as possible, and consider taking their garbage with them when they leave.
While plans are taking shape on shore, a team of pyrotechnics professionals is working away on the barge, which is actually two barges joined stern to stern, getting ready for tomorrow’s show.
A crew of 10 from Sirius Pyrotechnics is working with the international teams of four to eight people to prepare for each show. The crews work 10-12 hour days for three days straight ahead of each night, said Kelly Guille, chief fireworks producer with Sirius.
“It’s just a big sandbox with a deeper sandbox at the end where we allow teams to decide how they want their mortars split up,” Guille said. “We have max angles but other than that they can choose if they want to criss-cross, they can choose how that’s set up.”
Come show time, just Guille and three others will be on the barge to fire the show from the safety of a bunker at the far end of the barge. It’s all controlled and pre-set by computer.
After each show, a crew comes in to clean up and prepare the barge for the next team.
And the whole process starts over again to get ready for the next show.
For more information about Celebration of Light visit .
@JessicaEKerr
