Prague citizens will not lose their traditional way of celebrating the arrival of the new year!

The spectacular fireworks show will light up the sky above the Czech capital on January 1st. Further details will be available in early December. The organizers of last year’s fireworks decided together with the association Ohňostroj pro Prahu that they wanted to preserve this tradition for several decades, and at the same time, there will be a campaign ‘I WILL NOT SHOOT’ to prevent uncontrolled amateur firing of pyrotechnics.

“Fireworks have been, are and will be,” says Martin Peter, designer, and choreographer of the last five years fireworks in Prague.” Already during the time of Rudolf II, we were a real European cradle of fireworks, and Prague fireworks have been connecting people for many decades across history,” adds Peter.

According to his words, he does not want to let the popular cultural entertainment disappear only from the whims of the current leadership of Prague, which identifies with the unilateral views of environmental activists. “I get hundreds of questions about this year’s fireworks, and it was the support of our fans and citizens of Prague and the Czech Republic that made me try to save New Year’s fireworks,” says Peter.

Historically, fireworks have been fired from Letna Park, Vitkov, Petrin or the Vltava River, attracting hundreds of thousands of spectators and tourists. The Prague Fireworks and their organization were financed in previous years in cooperation with the Prague City Hall. For the first time, however, everything will be different, according to the director of the Fireworks association in Prague, Jan Šaršoun.

Photo: Veronika Pilařová

“As a fan of New Year’s fireworks, I founded a movement to preserve our cultural traditions, and by this action, I would like to give every citizen the feeling that Prague belongs to the people themselves,” explains Šaršoun. “I believe that people are interested in fireworks, so we leave the financing to their will. Every citizen of Prague, Czech citizen or organization can contribute to our transparent account with any amount and help save a part of our country’s culture.”

This gesture will show if citizens are interested in New Year’s fireworks. “We welcome any support from the public, and we want to thank you in advance for it,” says Šaršoun. “We would like to call on Prague citizens and residents of the Czech Republic to reduce the uncontrolled and dangerous form of firing pyrotechnics in the streets, in the spirit of the campaign I WILL NOT SHOOT, which we are also organizing in the framework of this event.”

“Public support and a commitment to tradition is our driving force. When preparing this year’s event, we proceeded according to legislative options and the only thing that can stop us is the bad weather,” observes Peter with a smile.

The exact location, size of the fireworks, details and its theme will be revealed at the beginning of December. Each citizen has the opportunity to comment and contribute through the website ohnostrojproprahu.cz, where it will be published current information on the upcoming event.