Biggest fireworks show in Idaho Falls history expected for final Melaleuca Freedom Celebration
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IDAHO FALLS — The final Melaleuca Freedom Celebration fireworks display will light up the sky in Idaho Falls Saturday night and Frank VanderSloot promises a night to remember.
“We are going to have the largest fireworks show ever in the history of Idaho Falls. It’s the biggest show we’ve ever done. We’re going to celebrate and pay tribute to the men and women who gave their lives, their limbs and their future so we could have the freedom we have today,” VanderSloot tells EastIdahoNews.com.
The show will begin shortly after 10 p.m. with 10.6 shells being shot in the air per second from Snake River Landing. The celebration has become so large over the decades that organizers stopped counting attendees two years ago when an estimated 220,000 spectators watched the fireworks in Idaho Falls, according to VanderSloot, who is Melaleuca’s Executive Chairman.
The annual Independence Day tradition began in 1992 at the Idaho Falls High School Ravsten Stadium. A few years later, it moved to a location near the Shilo Inn in downtown Idaho Falls along the Snake River.
As the largest fireworks show west of the Mississippi River grew, Melaleuca partnered with Ball Ventures to move the celebration to Snake River Landing in 2017. Riverfest, an all-day outdoor festival, was created, and people from around the world came to enjoy food trucks, bounce houses, live music, community booths, rides on the East Idaho News Chopper and other events before the breathtaking 31-minute fireworks display.
The original plan was to have the celebration at Snake River Landing for five years.
“There’s no other site in the nation that is like that anywhere. The venue at Snake River Landing has allowed Melaleuca to produce one of the five largest shows in the nation. Unfortunately, the property that has been used for the event is now being developed into housing and industry,” VanderSloot said last month when he announced the end of the celebration last month.
The fireworks will be choreographed, note-for-note, to a patriotic soundtrack that will air live on Classy 97 KLCE. The show will include large 5-, 6-, and 8-inch shells, which climb roughly 500 feet to 800 feet into the sky and break approximately the same distance wide, according to a news release.
“I just want to say thank you to everybody in this community for their support of this event. We’ve done it for 33 years. For some people who are 40 years old today, they grew up with this. It’s all they’ve known,” VanderSloot says. “I love to hear the stories of the kids coming home (for the fireworks). Our greatest, most precious natural resource in Idaho Falls is our kids. This is the best place ever to raise a family.”