LAUGHLIN – Not many kids are rewarded with explosives for mowing the lawn. But the pyrotechnician for Laughlin’s Rockets Over the River learned early the value of combustibility.
“My neighbor owned a pyrotechnic business,” said Ryan Foster, founder of Las Vegas based High Desert Pyrotechnics Inc. “I’d mow his lawn or do odd jobs for him and he’d pay me in firecrackers. I was the most popular kid in the neighborhood. By the time I was 14, I was packaging fireworks and working a stand.”
Making the move from detonating munitions to bagging groceries wasn’t a likely transition for the lively teenager from Sandy, Utah. Foster had found his niche and by the age of 20, was a licensed lead pyro, directing shows across the country.
“I worked my way up the food chain,” Foster said of his early years as a pyrotechnician. “Who doesn’t want to get paid to blow things up?”
In 2005, Foster set off on his own, determined to build a business where integrity was the first ingredient in his shows.
“I’d worked with a lot of companies that promised something but didn’t necessarily deliver the goods,” Foster said. “There’s a trend in this business that is all about numbers on paper. I was watching these shows, counting what was being put in the air and knew the client was getting ripped off. For what people were spending, I knew I could put on a hell of a better show.”
What Foster didn’t count on was mounds of red tape. The licensing and certification to open his own pyrotechnic business took more than a year.
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives had to approve Foster’s armaments storage bunker, clear his background and verify he was drug free. He had to obtain a pyrotechnician license from each state where he would fire shows, permits from the Department of Transportation to ship explosives and clearance from Homeland Security to import fireworks.
“There’s a big difference in the type of fireworks we work with and the stuff you can buy off the street,” Foster said. “The biggest shells the Average Joe can buy in Nevada are smaller than our smallest shells. You’re never going to get the types of effects that we do, with fireworks bought from a stand. Because of that, there’s a lot of oversight. Every agency out there is watching what we do and what we order.”
When those orders are coming from overseas and have the potential to blow up, it’s no wonder so many agencies have a hand in licensing pyrotechnicians, Foster said.
“When they say ‘slow boat from China,’ they aren’t kidding,” he said. “We get most of our product from China and a little from Australia.”
Foster makes several trips a year to fireworks factories in Asia and Australia, talking with producers about new effects and what he wants to achieve in his shows.
“I tell them ‘this is what I want’ and they’ll make it for me,” Foster said. “It’s one of the reasons our shows are different from everything else out there. Our shells are originals. They have been packaged specifically for High Desert.”
Foster has produced shows for the City of Mesquite, Red Bull, 20th Century Fox and the Las Vegas Country Club.
The 12,000 shots planned for the skies over Laughlin have been in the works since September.
“There’s a lot of planning that goes into a show,” Foster said. “First you inspect the site. Where you’re shooting will determine what you can do, from the types of effects to the size of the shells. Then you order your product.”
Another two months is spent packaging the product and the show has to be choreographed.
“We spend 30-40 hours choreographing the effects to music,” Foster said. “Then it takes about a week to physically set up a show the size of Laughlin, that’s with eight to 10 guys.”
All for 30 minutes of excitement.
But, for the little boy who liked walking around with a pocket full of firecrackers, showing off for friends, not a lot has changed.
“I still get a kick out of it,” Foster said. “No matter how many times I shoot a Fourth of July show, I still love it. You’ve been outside in 120 degree heat, it’s hot and you hate it. Then you hear people talking about the show and you can’t beat that feeling. You’re a rock star for a day.”
LTC, in partnership with the Bullhead City Fire Department and Bullhead City Police Department, will present their annual free fireworks show, Rockets Over the River, Saturday (July 4) at 9:15 p.m. from 703 Highway 95 in Bullhead City.
Rockets Over the River is choreographed to patriotic music broadcast on Murphy Broadcasting’s KHITS 104.9 FM.
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