These days, fireworks are a big business and there are now over 800 fireworks companies in the Liuyang area.Dancing Fireworks is a 20-year-old family run company. It now employs 1,600 people.By far the most popular fireworks the Dancing factory makes are what are known as display shells.These are for huge events like the Beijing Olympics, which Dancing supplied.Display shells like the ones in this wirehouse got to 300 metres and explode into massive starbursts.And they are still largely made by hand in factories like this.The workers at Dancing produce an extraordinary 2.7 million shells a year, that's one shell every 12 seconds.Each shell is made of a dome of pressed cardboard, with a time delay fuse stuck in with string and glue.The Dancing factory doesn't just assemble fireworks, it also comes up with new designs for the global market.One of the main ingredients used make gunpowders is a chemical called saltpetre.They use to get it from bat droppings found in caves.Nowadays, they make it synthetically but the principles are about the same.The science behind fireworks, however, that's really involved.And I've been given special permission to come here, to the factory development lab to take a look.
