National Park officials are pointing fingers after an influx of trash washed ashore at Aquatic Park over the weekend. The garbage, they claim the result of Saturday's Super Bowl City opening fireworks display, required a full days' worth of work to clean up and required an official to handle potentially dangerous unexploded fireworks included in the debris.
“I’ve never seen that much firework debris,” National Park Service ranger David Pelfrey told the Chronicle. “We were all pretty much caught by surprise.”
The trash, when collected, filled four 50-gallon trash cans.
“Our basic angle from our division’s perspective is we don’t like dirty beaches,” continued Pelfrey.
For past fireworks displays, think 4th of July celebrations, the city partners with a pyrotechnics company and uses eco-friendly explosives, reports the paper. This appears to have not happened this time around. Saturday's display was put on by Macy's in coordination with the Super Bowl 50 Host Committee, and they have another display scheduled for tomorrow night at 10 p.m.
When reached for comment by the Chronicle, a spokesman for Macy's seemed unconvinced that the garbage was from his company's show.
“All of our fireworks are self-consuming," Orlando Veras told the paper, "so that debris, I would venture to guess, are not from the show.”
Park officials disagree, and note they were not told about Saturday's show in advance. Hopefully, whatever caused larger amounts of fireworks debris to wash up on the beach following Saturday's fireworks display won't happen again, but the National Park Service remains worried about a garbage-strewn repeat following tomorrow night's show.
#SuperBowl fireworks leave #SF beach trashed, park officials say https://t.co/b92GI0ij06 #SB50 pic.twitter.com/to1AXj1GLK
— SFGate (@SFGate) February 4, 2016