By Joseph Knoop
In his 20 years overseeing CarmelFest fireworks, outgoing festival Chairman Jeff Worrell said it’s one the bigger shows he’s ever seen.
The CarmelFest fireworks show at 9:45 p.m. July 4 will discharge 1,400 mortar tubes of loads, each synchronized to music broadcast from by Carmel High School radio station (WHJE-FM, 91.3). More than 600 shells will be shot skyward for the celebration’s grand finale.
“We fill an entire parking lot with just racks and racks of mortar tubes,” Worrell said. “And each tube has a wire connected to a control booth that’s far away, connected to a computer.”
In the past, the fireworks celebration, whose cost today approaches $37,500, operated with only 15 mortar tubes. Each tube would be lit with a flare.
“We had runners and lighters,” Worrell said. “We had all the extra shells covered by a fireproof tarp, because stuff is raining down on you when you’re firing. In those days they were really slow.”
CarmelFest contracts for the services of Melrose Pyrotechnics, an award-winning fireworks company that has conducted shows for the Super Bowl, Taste of Chicago and Indy Racing League. Its work has taken its technicians to foreign nations, including like Korea, Singapore and Japan, where Melrose staged the Okinawa Fireworks Festival.
The Carmel Police Dept. motorcycle team escorts the pyrotechnicians at the beginning of the day to a “secret location,” Worrell said. The team works all day until just before 9:45 p.m., when the Carmel Symphony Orchestra hits its last note, the simulcast cranks up and the show begins.
“You’re seeing product built specially for us,” said Garry Poe, event producer for Melrose Pyrotechnics. “It’s more than just red, yellow, blue, green. We treat it like a canvas, so we’re not just shooting to the same spot.”
Worrell disputes the stereotype of fanatical carnies working a fireworks celebration.
“They are extremely professional,” Worrell said. “When I go to the shoot site, I have to do certain things before I can enter the blast zone, like turning off cell phones, my walkie-talkie. I have to be escorted by security. I swear, if it weren’t 98 degrees, these guys would be in suits and ties, that’s how professional they are.”
Even the Department of Homeland Security plays a role in the celebration’s security, including monitoring the truck that delivers the fireworks from northern Indiana.
Worrell said he’s proud of the community’s deep investment in the fireworks celebration.
“In other communities, the fireworks would be sponsored by some huge corporation who throws whatever amount of money at it, and we’re saying, ‘Hey, would you buy a $3 unlighted, $6 lighted spark button,’ and people don’t even bat an eye,” Worrell said.
