This year’s In­de­pen­dence Day fire­works dis­play will be com­plete­ly silent, but of­fi­cials promise the cul­tur­al cel­e­bra­tions lead­ing up to it will be loud, vi­brant and pa­tri­ot­ic.

Speak­ing at a me­dia brief­ing yes­ter­day, Min­istry of Cul­ture and Com­mu­ni­ty De­vel­op­ment com­mu­ni­ca­tions strate­gist Jerome Lewis as­sured the pub­lic that the fire­works dis­plays in both Port-of-Spain and San Fer­nan­do would be us­ing silent py­rotech­nics.

“We’re go­ing to have chore­o­graphed py­rotech­nics and a ma­jor fire­works dis­play. And yes, we will be pre­sent­ing silent fire­works to re­duce the loud bangs and the im­pact on pets and peo­ple who may live near­by. All of this will be co­or­di­nat­ed with the rel­e­vant avi­a­tion, fire, se­cu­ri­ty and reg­u­la­to­ry au­thor­i­ties,” Lewis said.