Pasco’s Grand Old 4th fireworks show may fizzle out by 2018

While most people are kicking back in a lawn chair watching fireworks on the Fourth of July, Pasco Fire Chief Bob Gear is running up and down the freeway shoulder putting out fires with a shovel.

Officials make sure each year there’s proper clearance around the launch tube racks at Gesa Stadium, but flaming debris inevitably falls nearby.

That includes on Interstate 182, where Gear tries to pick up the slack because his fire engines already are stationed at the show or busy with other emergency calls on the holiday.

But as new homes spring up southeast of the adjacent soccer fields, a typical west wind might blow embers into backyards.

“It’s just getting tight,” Gear said of the shrinking fallout zone for the annual fireworks display.

“I’m afraid if we have a night where we’ve got a 15 mph wind on an 80-some degree night, I’m going to have to say ‘No.’ We’re just going to throw debris too far,” he said.

Gear recently took his technical and safety concerns about the Grand Old 4th celebration to the Pasco City Council. The chief, along with city staff, asked council members to consider the adverse consequences of allowing the traditional public fireworks display to continue as it has in recent years.

“There have been differing issues going on with that show over the years as the area has developed, and developments kind of encroached the fallout area of the fireworks,” said Pasco City Manager Dave Zabell.

The attendance numbers at Gesa Stadium also have decreased over the years.

About 5,000 people now pack Wade Park to watch the Tri-City Regional Chamber of Commerce’s River of Fire Festival for free, instead of paying to watch in Kennewick’s Columbia Park.

Pasco does not sponsor or participate in the River of Fire program, so it does not organize crowd and traffic control or provide portable lighting and restrooms in the 25-acre riverfront park.

The barge is anchored on the Pasco side of the Columbia River because the Benton-Franklin boundary line follows the old river channel, and there is more room closer to Wade Park. That means the Pasco Fire Department is responsible for inspecting the barge every year and issuing the fireworks permit.

Booked for this summer

Rick Terway, Pasco’s administrative and community services director, said at the Feb. 27 meeting that he was on a deadline and had to commit to a fireworks show within a few weeks, or all of the pyrotechnic experts would be booked up for this summer.

After a half-hour discussion, the council agreed to go forward with the 2017 show in west Pasco, but to start negotiations with the regional chamber about a partnership on the river show and consider diverting resources next year.

The firing racks at the stadium this summer will be mounted on a trailer, which can be adjusted at the last minute if there is a concern with conditions or buildings in the fallout zone.

Recreation Services Manager Brent Kubalek said he would get talks going with regional chamber officials this month.

“It would be spectacular if we could join forces,” said Councilman Saul Martinez. “I gotta tell you, from my house I see both light shows. It just is not as loud as it could be because of the distance … but I’m willing to stay home to not have to deal with the traffic in both places, because the traffic is crazy.”

Pasco has sponsored the Grand Old 4th fireworks show at Gesa Stadium on Burden Boulevard since 1997. The show previously was held at Edgar Brown Memorial Stadium.

The stadium and its surrounding soccer fields technically can accommodate 6-inch firework mortar rounds, according to state regulations. But the property next to the fields no longer is vacant.

The required clearance around the firing area is 70 feet for every inch of the mortar’s size, so the 6-inch mortars used in the Pasco show require a 420-foot boundary.

That’s under perfect conditions — zero wind and about 30-percent humidity, so the grass won’t catch on fire, Gear said. Yet that’s rarely the case on that higher elevation point in Pasco.

“There have been a couple times when it’s been 9 o’clock, 9:30, before the winds died down enough for me to say, ‘OK,’” Gear told council members. “And mostly I keep looking up at that big crowd (around Gesa Stadium) and thinking, ‘What do I do if I have to say no, if it’s too windy?’ I don’t know if I can get out of there fast enough.”

‘Tired of chasing fires’

Debris has fallen as far as 1,500 feet downwind and started fires. In 2010, one of the firing racks — which consist of plastic pipe and wood — fell down and shot a round into the field to the east, hitting a fire truck and “scaring the heck out of” Gear.

It also is a requirement that after every show, firefighters have to search the area for live mortar rounds that were shot into the air but didn’t explode.

And Gear’s job putting out fires on I-182 is dangerous — cars whiz by at 70 mph, with drivers sometimes looking at the fireworks in the sky instead of the road in front of them.

“I’m getting a little old for that too, a little tired of chasing fires along the freeway there,” he said.

The Fourth of July isn’t the only time fireworks explode over the stadium.

The Tri-City Dust Devils put on 12 shows each season. They use 4-inch mortars, and the only issues have been complaints from neighbors whose family members and household pets have been awakened at 11 p.m. on a weeknight, Gear said.

But, if the wind is more than 10 mph or the area is under a red flag warning because of extreme fire danger, the chief said he will make the organization cancel the show. He added that the team usually makes it up after another game.

If Pasco decides in the future to cancel the holiday show at Gesa Stadium, Terway said the city still will have to make some decisions because Wade Park is “really a tough spot for us to hold a big show like that.”

Officials may look into trying to move the crowds west into the 127-acre Chiawana Park, which has more amenities for large crowds.

But they also have to consider that while Wade Park already gets about 5,000 people, comparable to the Water Follies crowd, that number could double along the Pasco riverfront if the River of Fire is the only show in town.

This story was originally published March 11, 2017 at 6:49 PM with the headline "Pasco’s Grand Old 4th fireworks show may fizzle out by 2018."