There is a possibility that Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan's Fourth of July fireworks will be launched from Sault, Ontario next year.
City officials will be launching their July 4th fireworks this year from Sault Ste. Marie Municipal Airport, also known as Sanderson Field, in order to avert a pyrotechnic catastrophe at the Soo Locks while the new lock is under construction.
“The Locks, where we usually fire them off, now has a construction project where there is a lot of gasoline and diesel fuel and some other potential explosive material on site and the fireworks that we’re shooting off are a grade above your normal consumer type fireworks so there are certain regulations that we have to follow. There is a safety radius around where you shoot them off,” said Brian Chapman, Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan city manager.
That said, the massive Lock construction project will continue and there is a chance Sault, Michigan July 4th fireworks will light up the sky from a Sault, Ontario location next year.
“I would say it’s an option. We’re not saying that’s what we’re going to do but yes, that is an option that we’ll take into consideration,” Chapman told SooToday.
“I would say it’s possible. That was an option that we looked at and when we really started to get under the gun to find a new location we thought of Canada and our friends in Sault, Ontario reached out to us with their municipal government and said if there’s anything they could do to help out to let them know, but we have an American contractor that has these large explosives and trying to get them across the border was just impractical at this point.”
Chapman said the City of Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will try to secure another safe spot near the Locks for next year’s July 4th fireworks.
Meanwhile, Canada Day fireworks are still scheduled to be launched from a barge in the St. Marys River on July 1, despite a fire ban
