TWO fireworks technicians have died after an explosion at a lakeside wedding celebration for which they were organising the pyrotechnics.
The victims, a man and a woman, had been booked to stage an evening display at a luxury property in Ecclerigg, Cumbria, next to Lake Windermere.
They had joined about 70 guests who had gathered to mark the wedding of local insurance firm boss John Simpson and his partner Nicole Rothwell who married earlier in the week.
Witnesses and neighbours spoke of an "almighty bang" on Saturday followed by a series of "smaller bangs and pops", with one comparing the initial sound to that of a wartime bombing. A shed containing the fireworks erupted into flames and spread to another building and a parked car nearby.
Witnesses at Brockhole Lake District Visitor Centre said the noise of fireworks went on for about 20 minutes before firefighters arrived on and doused the blaze.
The Tree Top Trek adventure centre at Brockhole was evacuated as a precaution.
A man who attended the celebration, who did not wish to be named, said: "There was this almighty bang and then the fireworks started going off. We were wondering why it was being held in the bright daylight.
"The shed was somewhere behind the marquee so I couldn't see the flames but there was debris all around and I could see a large plume of smoke. All the guests were running away. It was terrible."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article