Akiko Amano says she once saw the God of Fire. It was around 10 years ago when she first started working as a hanabishi (professional fireworks setter). That night, she was working at a countryside fireworks festival.
The opening ceremony took a little longer than scheduled, delaying the start of the fireworks display. As she made her final checks on the wiring, she stopped by a bank of cylinders for launching "starmines" -- a type of firework shot off in rapid succession through 12-cm-diameter cylinders.
Moments after she completed her check, more than 100 of the fireworks were shot with a roar to a height of some 120 meters by the electronic firing system, controlled by other fireworks setters who assumed nobody was around. Amano was just 10 meters from the cylinders.