Standing beneath a drizzle of fire and cinders, wearing several thick layers of protective cotton clothing and a hard hat with a shield, Chad Carr BSc Phy ’91 is in his element.

"I’ve always been a bit of a pyro bug," he admits. "As a boy, I was always as close as I could get to the 4th of July fireworks shows." Carr’s fascination with fire found a creative outlet at Mines.

Since 1988, he’s been one of the men behind those awesome E-Days fireworks displays.

The E-Days fireworks tradition was started in the 1980s by Christopher Weege BSc Pet ’84 and Scot Anderson BSc Phy ’79, members of Sigma Nu fraternity.

Carr entered CSM and joined the fraternity in 1987. Except for two years when the School hired an outside contractor to put on the display, he’s been a part of every show.

Even today, where everything is bigger and more spectacular than ever, the E-Days show is special.

Its audience is small and close to the action so ground effects, which can’t be used for large audiences because of their expense and low visibility, are included along with the aerial flares.

Ground flares—such as comets that crisscross the field, a 40-foot tall by 100-yard wide waterfall and a huge "M" that blows up at the end of the show—add excitement to every event. "Originally, the shows were hand-fired," Carr explains. "Switching from ground effects to aerials gave us a chance to reload." Today’s shows are electrically fired, but they "stick to that format out of tradition and because it works well to add surprises for the audience."

Fireworks come in a variety of types. A "salute," as the name suggests, is a big explosion and a flash of light. Salutes can be aerial or on the ground, as in the cannonade of ground salutes in the finale of each E-Days show.

"Stars" are the burning bits that fill the sky after a shell explodes. "Chrysanthemums" are shells whose stars leave a trail of sparks (a tail). "Peonies" have stars that are just points of light (no tails). Within each type are subtypes.

Pattern shells expand into a heart, a ring, an elephant or other shapes. Crossette shells spread out, then crack into four pieces near the end. Shell of shells break open, expand, then break open again.

Colors are made by blending metal salts into the star formulations. Copper gives a bluish tone, sodium is yellow, strontium is red. During manufacturing, the salts are mixed to make the colors. "Some of them get very elaborate," says Carr. "If you see a really good green, you know a lot of work has gone into it. Green is the hardest color to make."

Night Musick, owned by Marc Williams, is the company responsible for the E-Days shows and is unique in that it has no employees.

Carr, Anderson and other engineers volunteer "for the sheer fun of it." Each year, Night Musick does three or four 4th of July shows, several homecomings and a few New Year’s shows in addition to E-Days. July 4th shows usually last 15 to 20 minutes, homecomings a little less, New Year’s shows only three to five minutes, more of a punctuation to a celebration than a full show, Carr notes.

E-Days shows typically last 20 to 25 minutes. "In the old days, they went almost an hour," Carr says, "but they were hand lit so there were more pauses."

Like everything else, computers have simplified some aspects of putting on a show. Night Musick uses a computer simulation program to predict how different combinations will work.

For example, a difficult but spectacular display might include launching a ring shell, followed by a salute shot through the center a few seconds later, known as "shooting the ring." Timing, of course, is important and difficult so they use the computer-controlled system to fire the shows because it is more precise.

Even "shoot to music" shows can be choreographed by computer. But as much as computers may help, designing a great show still is done the old-fashioned way: with brainpower.

Planning an E-Days show takes almost a man year, says Carr. Throughout the year he looks for ideas. "There are always new styles of effects." He finds out about them at fireworks trade shows, such as the Western Winter Blast held each year in Lake Havasu, Ariz.

While setting fireworks has become safer and easier through electronics, setting up the E-Days show still requires a hands-on approach and long hours of work.

Plywood is laid down to protect the field.

Effects must be protected from the weather (one snowy year, Carr and the set-up crew used three miles of Saran wrap) and 100s of rolls of masking tape are used to keep things in place. 

Some years the weather is so hot they work shirtless. Other years they battle snow and ice.

No matter how difficult the planning and preparation, though, Carr always enjoys the show. "It’s an adrenalin rush," he says.

By Maureen Keller

Mines Magazine, November/December 1999