Duluth MN 1988 fireworks explosion - Channel 3 report

[@HeloChick]

Man! Great times. Don’t make memories like that anymore. Was telling my son about this just last week.

[@riversonglovesthedr]

I remember this so well. I was with my family outside Fairlawn in Superior. Superior would always wait for Duluth to do their fireworks and then do ours. We knew something was wrong because the fireworks went off waaaaay too fast and WAY too big.

[@charlessmith263]

I had seen a lot of videos on KZbin of professional fireworks shows. There were some errant misfires of shells at some of the July 4 firework shows over the years in Washington D.C.---for instance, a 20-inch peony shell blowing up prematurely on the ground mid-display. When I saw that, I was scared of a major chain reaction--fearing that a so-called 15-minute display would be only 2 minutes if the chain reaction happened. Fortunately, strict controls kept those professional fireworks from going out of control in such misfires. I also know that there was a similar July 4 pro fireworks disaster somewhere on the California Coast 5 or so years prior, where a computer malfunction caused 30,000 to 40,000 pieces of fireworks that would last 15 minutes to blow up in a chain reaction above ground, causing the show to be only 20 or so seconds, with an effect like a nuclear bomb had detonated over the coast. What a mishap!

[@Sunny-sy2xl]

Nice mullets going on there!

[@wwtf7180]

I was there. Seems like yesterday.

[@taconite]

Taconite MN. fire department must of did this.

[@rynz_2893]

Didn't this happen a second time years ago?

[@BellaNTheBeast]

The very next year, actually. Not nearly like this but yes. There was another mishap in '89.