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Post by Admin on Nov 29, 2019 2:17:29 GMT
The beloved balloons flew, if lower than usual, as the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade rolled on after an anxious weather watch Thursday. Astronaut Snoopy, a new version of a longtime parade favorite, was among the giant inflated characters leading the lineup. Parade officials and the New York Police Department had been keeping an eye on wind gauges along the 2.5-mile (4-kilometer) parade route that snakes through Manhattan. The National Weather Service had projected sustained winds of up to 24 mph (39 kph) with gusts to 40 mph (64 kph) during the parade. City rules require balloons to be grounded if sustained winds exceed 23 mph (37 kph) and gusts exceed 34 mph (55 kph). The balloons have been grounded only once for weather-related reasons, in 1971.
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Post by Admin on Nov 29, 2019 6:46:17 GMT
The parade nearly didn't even go on as planned; forecasted winds of up to 40 mph could have grounded the parade's iconic, massive balloons, out of fear that they could cause injury to attendees. However, New York Police Department officers gave the parade the OK to fly the balloons — although they are at a lower height than usual. Ahead of the annual event, Macy's executive director of special events told Al Roker during the Today show that the balloons were cleared for takeoff, but that they'll fly a bit lower than usual. "We're gonna start them off and we're gonna fly," the executive said. "They'll be flying a little lower but we'll see how it goes." New York Police Department officers monitored the weather all along the planned parade route before they made the call Thursday morning that the 16 large floats will end up airborne after all. "These sergeants are well trained to read the anemometers to identify the height of where we can allow the balloons to go up," explained NYPD Chief of Patrol Rodney Harrison. "The balloons can actually go up to 55 feet in height, but if it comes to a situation where there is a public safety we will bring them down to 10 feet."
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Post by Admin on Nov 29, 2019 19:53:02 GMT
Doc McGhee has revealed exactly how Kiss was, in Paul Stanley's words, "screwed over and misled" during their appearance at the 2014 Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.
Stanley made those comments on Twitter shortly after the nationally televised event, which found Kiss performing on a stripped-down float that was a far cry from their usual bombastic stage presentations. Stanley said "we ALL deserved better," without going into details about what went wrong.
Five years later, band manager McGhee filled in the missing puzzle pieces during a Q&A session aboard the ninth annual Kiss Kruise.
"The worst thing we did was we played the Macy's Day Parade," he said. "We were supposed to be on the Gibson float, which was this huge float. So, it was great; it's just like Kiss. Well, the night before we found out that they wanted Paul to play Gibson [guitars], and he doesn't play Gibsons – because he plays Washburns. So, we couldn't go on the float. They go, 'Oh, we have another float for you.'"
Problem solved, right? Wrong. "So, we get there, and [the new float] is literally like, 25 feet long with two microphones on it. We looked like the shittiest thing on the Macy's Day Parade. When I saw it I went, 'ohhhh, this is how you get fired.' That was just a horrible time."
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Post by Admin on Nov 30, 2019 6:05:10 GMT
The Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, one of the largest in the world, has been held annually since 1952 and is televised by NBC for those who are unable to make it to New York City (hence how the aforementioned footage was captured). The parade is most famous for its giant balloons depicting beloved pop culture characters, many of which have been from "geek culture," including Spider-Man introduced in 1987, Pikachu introduced in 2001, and Goku from Dragon Ball, introduced just last year in 2018. The balloon in question, however, Sonic, debuted in 1993 and was the first video game character to be featured in the parade. Unfortunately, it was also the same year that disaster would strike. Winds were unusually high on that fateful Thanksgiving day in 1993, and those in charge of the balloons were having difficulty controlling them. News footage caught the sight of the winds dragging Sonic into a light post at Columbus Circle, which tore open his face and caused him to pop. It also broke the light post off of the building, causing the balloon to be dragged down and injure a child and an off-duty police officer. Sonic wasn't the only casualty that year either, as Rex the Dinosaur was unceremoniously torn asunder by a traffic light.
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Post by Admin on Nov 30, 2019 18:35:59 GMT
Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade viewers took to Twitter to react to Today co-anchor Hoda Kotb butchering the pronunciation of Dragon Ball Z's new video game, Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot, while she and co-anchor Savannah Guthrie described the game's giant float during the historic annual event. The title of the game had Kotb cracking up, which many anime enthusiasts laughed at, in turn. Given the job of explaining Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot, and how it will give fans the chance to relive Goku's story in celebration of the anime's 30th anniversary, Kotb started laughing and was barely able to compose herself long enough to say that Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot would be releasing on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One in January.
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