The IFA Fireworks Festival - Fireworks Comptition

  Liuyang, China
Sunday, October 28, 2007

Load 17 Tons and What Do You Get?

On Sunday, Oct 28th, 2007, on a field 2000 feet wide and 300 feet deep the pyrotechnics were spread so dense that it took 17 metric tons of explosive compositions to fill the mortar racks, candle fans, single shot comet devices of every type, cakes as far as the   
eyes could see and roman candles reaching up through to the top of the scaffolds set up for the set piece that stretched well the width of the main batteries.  There were strobes hanging over the edge of the retaining wall of the Liuyang River as well as 48 cases of water shell cakes balanced at its edge. Girandolas and every other type of pyrotechnic device dotted the field

To imagine how much pyrotechnics that is. .  Consider approximately 8,000 cues, some with as many as 50 items each. 8500 shells, 500+ Display Cakes . . . Enough pyrotechnics to more than fill a 40 foot container . . . Four pyrotechnics teams representing France, China, the USA and Australia competing to fill the sky with grandeur, grace and dynamic choreography to a wide variety a powerful music.

While many pyros have worked on shows this large, I have not in my wildest dreams imagined I would be sitting with Larry Mattingly half way around the world from my home, in a dusty field in the Hunan Province of China, in the City of Liuyang, wiring up single shot comets as fast as we could go into 16 shot sequencing modules for 5 hours followed by installing batteries and assisting in running main cables, at the invitation of Chad Barrette of ProFormance Pyrotechnics of Australia.

 

 




















Mira LaCouse Wiring and Mira, Melva and Chad Barrett





There were a variety of Chinese entertainers who preformed between each of the 4 fireworks shows giving our senses a reprieve from the bombardment of vivid colors and fabulous fireworks, but even these we laced with flame pots and mines to emphasize the high energy performances.

 















The field was littered with the reminants from the Opening Night Panda Fireworks Show but all the fireworks you see here are for the Competion Fireworks Sunday Night.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  























 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

























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Jackie Whedbee