Vernon’s Canada Day organizer explains why drone show did not go ahead

Several thousand people filled Polson Park Monday night (July 1) for the drone show that was supposed to end Canada Day celebrations in Vernon, but unfortunately, the show was not able to go ahead.

Mayla Janzen, the head of the organizing committee from Vernon Okanagan Inspired Community Events (VOICE), said Illumin, the company that puts on the drone events, was getting ready for the 10 p.m. show when an equipment problem took place caused by some spectators.

Canada Day in Polson Park 2024 (Liam Verster / Vernon Matters photo)

“We had a great audience. I was really excited about that, but the park was getting a little bit crazy because there was a lot of people everywhere,” Janzen explained. “We had about 13 security folks down on the drone area guarding everything, but unfortunately, just a few minutes before the show was about to start, some folks on electric scooters ran over one of the key antennas. It’s apparently a pretty sensitive piece of equipment. We gave them [Illumin] a bit of time to trouble shoot and see if things were going to work and if we could go ahead, and we were told about 10 after 10 o’ clock, we couldn’t get the show up in the air.”

Janzen said she made an announcement that the show was not able to go ahead, and they shifted their focus to getting everyone safely out of the park.

Show cancelled (VOICE Society image on Instagram)

Janzen said her committee and Illumin had earlier conversations about the importance of security which is why she hired extra people and they brought in extra volunteers to guard the drone area.

“We did our absolute best to secure the area and to prevent something like this from happening,” Janzen told Vernon Matters. “Even as the situation occurred, there were three people chasing after them [people on scooters] and yelling at them [not to go into that area], but they just ignored and pressed forward and unfortunately ruined it for everybody else.”

Janzen says she initially saw some negative comments about the issue online, but after that she said “the outpouring of positive has definitely drowned that out.”

“We have had immense support with people saying ‘I’m really sorry for what’s happened and that you’re going through this,’ even down to one saying ‘that was the best Canada Day we’ve had in Vernon for years,’ and we had a lot of fun in the park. Thank you for doing this.’”

Janzen said she only had about a week and a half to announce and promote the drones, and she was very impressed with the turnout.

“We had about 5,000 people, if not more, come out just for the show which really shows that were are supported and cared for in this community. We will try to figure something out and make it up to the community and do it at another time.”

As for future fireworks on July 1, Janzen said they can’t be lit off in Polson Park, and it can be difficult to get everyone over to the lake to watch those, so it’s not known if that is a possibility in the future.

The fire risk was one of the main reasons for not holding them this year.

Canada Day in Polson Park (Liam Verster/Vernon Matters photo)

As for Canada Day itself, Janzen says about 3,000 people attended over the day and they have received a number of positive comments.

“We had a very good turnout earlier in the day,” Janzen said. “The rain kind of dampened things a bit and a lot of folks went to take shelter at home and do something else. But the fact that we had more people come out later for the show that had been there all day, what a fantastic turnout and we really appreciate the community for that.”

Monday was Canada’s 157th birthday.