Southwark Cathedral

As challenges go, this was going to be right up there with the most physically challenging display that we had ever…well…lifted into position!

The brief was to perform a fireworks display to commemorate the 800th anniversary of the Great Fire of Southwark…from the roof of Southwark Cathedral.

The first question that was posed was “how do we get all the fireworks and equipment to the roof?”. There were just so many challenges to overcome.

We were not allowed to use a crane next to the cathedral, the display had to be lifted into position manually whilst services were taking part so we had to be quiet whilst achieving this and security was really high in the centre of London.

On our site visit we walked from ground level, through the cathedral to the stair well. The stairwell was a spiral design and narrow, then onto a walkway and even further still, up another set of steps onto an uneven roof.

To put this into perspective, we had to lift heavy equipment and fireworks up 208 steps, twisting and turning up stairs and along corridors to our firing site. What could possibly go wrong!!

We had to design a display whereby every piece of equipment was measured so that we knew everything would fit up the stairwell. If you know London well you can picture the location of Southwark Cathedral which is in quite close proximity to the Shard.

After many consultations with the emergency services and every conceivable management and health and safety department we had been given the go-ahead to perform the display. Our team were booked in…the fittest, strongest team we had…and then we had “that” phone call!! It went along the lines of…”how would you like to also perform a daylight display on the same day so that when we have our commemoration we have a special fireworks display when all the emergency services are in attendance?”.

How could we say no. We then had to add more equipment and fireworks for the daylight display and be in London in situ very early in the morning to rig two displays from the same location. But there was immediately another logistical nightmare. The roof would not fit both daylight and nighttime displays together so we would have to fire the daylight display, make the area safe, de-rig that display and then rig the main display within a few hours.

We worked out the timings to the last minute.

The day arrived and our team worked tirelessly to get all the gear to the roof. Everything was in place for the first display and we started on time. Gerbs and waterfall units being fired from the highest points on the cathedral looked perfect with cascading cold sparks whilst pyro mines, candles and single shots full of smoke and bright comets lit up the sky above. It was an immediate success and the client was amazed at what we had created.

We had no time to waste. Once the display had cooled down and we had completed all our fire checks we dismantled the display and started to rig the bigger main display. Yes we were exhausted but again we pushed through this and started the display on time for our night time spectacular presentation.

As the fireworks burst above the cathedral we created magical reflections in the glass of the Shard with mines, candles and cakes which culminated in a large barrage of big mines with red, white and blue colours with gold glittering stars. This was a huge success and looked so spectacular in the centre of London with many people around the venue stopping and watching in awe at what we had created.

The de-rig was great fun and full of positive comments, well that is how we remember this day, but our team said it was full of cramp and aches and pains when we had finished!

Either way the client was overwhelmed, saying how impressed they were with both displays and we had most definitely avoided another Great Fire of London which was a relief! A highly technical, high pressure and very hard physical day was completed successfully and safely and confined to our history as another unique experience.