Truck loaded with fireworks explodes; at least four dead

BONITA SPRINGS, Fla. -- A tractor-trailer loaded with fireworks for the town's Fourth of July celebration exploded into flames at a beach park Wednesday, killing at least four people and injuring two, authorities said.

"It just all happened at once," said Kevin McKenzie, who was mowing grass about 300 feet from the truck when the explosion occurred. "Immediately it was all the fireworks going off with all the colors and the flames."

The 2:10 p.m. explosion shot flames and fireworks from the truck and also spawned some small brush fires. There was no immediate word on what caused the blast.

"It's a major black fire right now with rolling black smoke going across the skyway," McKenzie told the Naples Daily News.

The fireworks were from Sunset Fireworks of the St. Louis suburb of Dittmer, Mo. A person who answered the phone at the company's main office said officials were on their way to the fire from Missouri.

Bonita Springs Councilman Wayne Edsall said the blast happened as workers unloaded the truck. He said the fireworks were for Friday's festivities in Bonita Springs, a city of about 30,000 near the Gulf of Mexico between Fort Myers and Naples.

Mary Mike Dearden, an employee of the Lover's Key Beach Club and Resort, said she felt the earth shake. Guests at the resort saw smoke and heard explosions from the park, located less than a mile from the resort building.

"At the front desk we heard the explosion starting like a clap of thunder and then it kept rolling," she said.

According to the company's Web site, Sunset Fireworks has been in the pyrotechnics business for more than 40 years and provided fireworks for organizations including Walt Disney World, Six Flags Theme Parks, the St. Louis Cardinals and the Jacksonville Jaguars.

Earlier this year, Sunset Fireworks and its sister Pyro Products Inc. were sued in St. Louis for negligence by two of five workers injured in explosions that killed two others at a Pyro Products plant in eastern Missouri.

The lawsuits were filed on behalf of Lori Rhodes, 37, and Sharon Hillman, 51, as well as Rhodes' child, who was born prematurely the day her mother was injured at the Pyro Products plant about 40 miles southwest of St. Louis.

Rhodes, of De Soto, Mo., suffered second-degree and third-degree burns over nearly three-fourths of her body in a Nov. 5, 1999, blast that killed Amy Meyers, 25, of Cedar Hill, Mo. Hillman, 51, of De Soto, was hurt in an explosion June 6, 2001.

Another worker, Pearl M. Mathews, 60, also of Cedar Hill, was killed in a September 2000 explosion at the plant.

Pyro Products was assessed $39,000 in fines for the 1999 blast and $14,000 for the one in 2000, though the company negotiated those penalties to a total of $13,000.

Pyro Products has challenged allegations of safety violations in the 2001 case and a proposed $242,000 fine. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration accused the company of willful disregard of safety regulations.

The status of that matter was not immediately available Wednesday.

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On the Net

Sunset Fireworks: www.sunsetfireworks.com