New Year set to kick off with record temperatures but fewer fireworks

Friday 30 December 2011

As the Netherlands prepares to celebrate the New Year on Saturday night, weather forecasters say the temperature could be as high as 10 Celsius during the festivities.

While there will be some showers, it will be dry in many places, but windy on the coast, weather service weeronline.nl said on Friday afternoon.

On New Year's Day itself, the temperature could be as high as 13 Celsius, making it the warmest January 1 since 1921, weeronline.nl said. However, the mild temperatures will be accompanied by blustery winds and rain.

Celebrations

According to ING bank economists, 81% of the population will not set off fireworks during the festivities, a slight increase on last year. Firework fans themselves are spending less: down from €47 to €45.

Last year, some €65m in fireworks went up in smoke during the New Year celebrations. This year it will be less because of the gloomy economic prospects, the ING economists said.

Illegal fireworks

By December 22, police had seized nearly 77,500 tonnes of illegal fireworks which had been smuggled into the country for the celebrations but the final toll is likely to be over 100,000 tonnes.

On Friday, police and bomb disposal experts were called to a house in Nieuwerkerk aan den IJssel, where a 14-year-old boy had made a firework bomb using fireworks and flammable liquids. His parents involved the police when they smelt the explosives.

© DutchNews.nl