Choose a location for your fireworks

Firing area, danger zone and audience position

You need an open space with enough room for the shells you plan to fire. This will be your firing area or firing field, and it is a dangerous area during the show.

Around each individual firework shell there is a danger zone. Its radius equals the specified safety distance. No one should remain inside the danger zone while a shell is being fired.

Think about how you will be able to monitor the area — You need to make sure no one unknowingly ends up in the danger zone during your fireworks display. Consider:

Do you have a forest behind you or a fence at the side that bounds the area?
Could a curious neighbour slip into the firing area without you noticing?
Would it be worth marking off your firing area with warning tape as a precaution?
Do you need someone to guard your firing area?

Designate a spot for the audience to stand that is safe for them. It should be at a safe distance from the firing field while still giving them a good view of your show. This is also where you place the music!

Plan your firing field in advance

Draw a plan of your firing field on paper:

Where will you position the shells? Mark their locations and also draw to-scale circles showing the safety distances!
In what order will they be lit?
Where will the audience stand?
Where will you stand and how will you move, so that you are always far enough away from the shells being fired?

Tips for good shell placement:

Place smaller shells with shorter safety distances further forward, closer to the audience. That way you can move back into the field when it is time to light them.
Do not place all shells in the same spot — spread them out in groups across several positions. That way you can light a shell and then move to a safe spot, such as the next shell to be lit.

The size of the firing field — the foundation of the show

Because you need to move out of a shell’s danger zone after lighting it, the size of the firing field has a major impact on how the show turns out.

If you fire all your shells from one and the same spot, you walk into the zone to light a shell, come back out, wait, and then go back in to light the next one.

This is the most common method for firing consumer fireworks. Its drawback is that there are pauses between shells. It does not feel like a “show” in the same way as a professional display.

If you have plenty of space, you can plan a larger firing field. You can then safely move to the next shell and light it as the previous one finishes firing. In a large finale, it is common to let several shells fire simultaneously.