America Marks Its 250th Birthday With Storms, Sweat and Fire
Independence Day celebrations were canceled nationwide and the Brooklyn Bridge briefly caught fire. Yet Americans still found countless ways to celebrate.
America’s 250th birthday party on the Fourth of July extended into the early hours of the Fifth, with an enormous fireworks display that began seconds before midnight in its capital. That capped a coast-to-coast celebration that featured fighter jets, marching bands, dirt bikes and a parade of recalcitrant thunderstorms.
Lightning, record-breaking heat and wayward pyrotechnics brought a measure of unpredictability to a day that had been planned for years. That was a fitting tribute for a country that has proved, again and again, difficult to manage.
As the evening’s headline event was set to start in Washington — a presidential address followed by what organizers billed as “the largest pyrotechnics display in the history of the world” — the approach of severe storms forced a sudden and chaotic evacuation.
Thousands of confused attendees sought shelter in nearby Smithsonian museums, the headquarters of the Internal Revenue Service and a McDonalds. The evacuation order was lifted two hours later, bringing the crowds back to wait in security lines that stretched for blocks.
President Trump, determined to give his address on the actual holiday, began speaking a little after 11 p.m. “After two and a half centuries, this American republic still stands tall and strong, and we love each other,” he said. “That showed tonight. You heard it was over, and what happened? You came back!”
