Oops! What’s With All The Fireworks Mishaps Across Michigan?

Dealing with explosives can be quite volatile! Nothing says summertime like fireworks, although several recent events here in the Mitten did not exactly go quite to plan.

These events which take thousands of dollars to fund and countless hours to coordinate, only amount to about 20 minutes worth of entertainment! That is, unless you're Dundee, Michigan...

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Mayfly Music Festival

Over on the east side of the state residents of the Village of Dundee gathered at Wolverine Park on June 18 for the Mayfly Music Festival, which included a fireworks show. What was supposed to be a 20 minute long fireworks extravaganza ended up lasting only 32 seconds as all the explosives went off simultaneously! So what went wrong?

In a Facebook statement the Dundee Area Business Association said, 

...the fireworks company has followed up with us. There was no wrong button pushed to activate the show. There was a malfunction with the ignitor system...They have graciously refunded our money and apologize for our disappointment. The Mayfly Festival Committee is happy that no one was hurt during this incident

Allegan's July 3 Jubilee

An annual tradition, Allegan once again celebrated Independence Day with a festival along the riverfront boardwalk which culminated in a fireworks show. I'm fortunate enough to have a decent viewing spot from my parents backyard in Allegan, but as we were watching we thought we heard a sound that just wasn't...quite...right.

It turns out there was a fireworks malfunction and one of the barges on the river that was launching fireworks caught fire!

Towards the end of the show you could hear sirens blaring as emergency vehicles headed to the riverfront. From what I was able to gather, it appeared that the fireworks did not properly launch and instead stayed smoldering on the barge and caused a quick fire. Thankfully no injuries were reported and it appears the fire extinguished itself.

It could have been a lot worse! Did you experience any fireworks mishaps during your holiday weekend?