Fireworks

[pete9012S]

Yes,marvellous research Fiona,especially Crack! Splutter-crack! Bang!!!

[Jack400]

Are the most powerful fireworks actually available to buy in the shops, I wonder, or are they reserved for public displays only?

Yes, they are, Anita. Some years ago the police issued a warning that some "professional" fireworks had been stolen. The problems being that not only are they too powerful to be set off in the confines of a 'normal' garden but they are meant to be ignited electronically from a remote control system, rather than someone standing next to it with a match. They are meant to fire immediately not when the touch paper has burnt.

[Anita Bensoussane]

Cheers, Jack!

[Fiona1986]

Thanks Fiona. I think I must be thinking of Good Work Secret Seven. Great blog post by the way - I really had no idea there were so many short stories featuring Bonfire Night!

Neither did I! I had expected to throw together a short post and it turned into a mammoth task . I did have it in my head that there were two Secret Sevens which featured fireworks, but I quickly browsed the cave reviews and couldn't identify which the other one would be. And then I found so many other stories that I didn't go back to look again. Having grabbed that book off the shelf, though, they start talking about Fireworks on the second page!

Jack has a humdinger (which cost three shillings and sixpence!), and later when they accidentally set off the fireworks in the shed there are rockets, squibs, blue-flashes and whirligigs.

[sixret]

Well, I have to search for the words like humdinger, squibs(at first I thought a typo!) and whirligigs using Google!

[IceMaiden]

Where I'm from a whirligig is one of those collapsible washing lines that look like a cobweb! The others I've heard of as fireworks though .

[Spitfire]

Gosh, thanks for the further information, Fiona. I did wonder how you did your research, now I know! Still no Jumping Jacks though, goodness knows what I'm thinking of there.

I know those washing lines as 'whirligigs' too, Ice Maiden. I do love the names of fireworks, they are very descriptive - or suggestive! - of the fun to come.

[Fiona1986]

Thanks to the cave it was easy to put in searches for 'fireworks' and 'bonfire' then look through all the titles (and the books they came from). Obviously it doesn't pull up works containing those phrases unless it's in a title, which is why I missed the other SS book. So who knows how many other fireworks are out there?

[Darrell71]

Don't know if I'm going slightly off topic here, but has anyone else been in India during diwali? Man, the fireworks constantly going on for 5 days are noisy, polluting, and drive my dog crazy. I don't even burst them anymore, as they just cause too much pollution here.

[Ming]

Sunskriti, I've never been to India during Diwali but I have attended Wiwali celebrations in Ithaca organized by Indian students. Of course, they're a shadow of what they're like in India according to my friends, but I loved the very festive atmosphere.

I absolutely love fireworks. I think private displays are banned in Bangladesh, so the only time I get to see them are perhaps during Hindu pujas and celebrations, although with the increasing Islamicization ( ) going on here, that too seems to have lessened. In New Zealand you can't buy fireworks except on Guy Fawkes Day, and there are public displays as well. I went to New Brighton beach for the display and it was wonderful. Cold, too cold, but wonderful!

During homecoming every year at Cornell there's a fireworks display in the "football" stadium. That particular showing always gives me goosebumps. School pride is something I've always had and it's just so nice that everyone celebrates it during homecoming, even though we're almost always guaranteed to lose the game!

[Moonraker]

I absolutely love fireworks.

Yes, I have wonderful memories of fireworks in our garden as a child. Official displays are too 'perfect'. You can't beat setting off your own in your own private garden!

[Lenoir]

I also used to look forward to it as a child, with the family. We were allowed to run about in the dark with sparklers to light the way.
The fireworks were set off at intervals by our dad and the best one left until last. We also had a bonfire burning, but we never had a guy.

[Rob Houghton]

That sounds very much like us. We also never had a guy. My dad didn't like the idea of burning a 'person' on a fire - but we never really missed having one.

[Moonraker]

No, we didn't either. In fact we didn't have a bonfire!

[Julie2owlsdene]

On our local news last night, it showed one mother's plight for fireworks to be not sold in the shops. Her daughter was badly burned by a firework attaching itself to her scarf, and they followed all the codes and stood well away as the firework was being set off etc, but her child has had to under go a series of skin drafts etc and she was saying it was horrific to hear her 4 year old screaming in pain, even when her dressing are being changed at the hospital she is in utter agony, and screaming. So very sad to hear of such a thing happening. And I bet this wasn't the only incident that happened on 5th November either.

She is now getting up a petition to have fireworks banned in the shops so the public can't buy them for their own displays and wants only organized displays so people can go and watch and be hopefully safe.

Two sides to every story I know.