A FIREWORKS expert has spoken of his shock after finding a partially exploded pyrotechnic – in a public street.

Dave Evans was forced to make the “massively dangerous” firework safe after spotting it on Leslie Street in Pollokshields and realising it was 75 per cent still ‘live’.

It comes as residents in the community have organised a demonstration on Bonfire Night as they say the neighbourhood is being ruined by dangerous anti-social behaviour.

The firework – an Aquarius – is a box of multiple fireworks linked together to be set off by a single fuse.

It had not been set alight properly and only a quarter had burned.

Dave, a freelance special effects expert and pyrotechnician, said: “I quickly noticed it had only partly gone off but it also looked as though it had been sitting there for quite some time as the base was well saturated with water.

“I very carefully carried it round to my flat where we have garden space at the back and doused it with three buckets of water before calling 101.

“They were very good and a fire engine appeared around 30 minutes later and made sure it was inert.”

Dave is very clear that fireworks should be left to the professionals and advised calling 101 but staying at the scene to alert other people to the danger.

He added: “This was the sort of thing you would use at a large private event or a small public display.

“It would cause some pretty serious damage.

“Fireworks eject balls of compressed metal that burns at high temperatures so that’s why fireworks cause such serious burns – it’s white hot metal coming into contact with skin.

“It’s massively dangerous for children to be using these.”

A spokesman for the Pollokshields Trust said the community would be meeting on November 5 at 8.45pm at Maxwell Square Park in a bid to discourage the scenes of anti-social behaviour that lead to arrests last year.

The community was terrorised by males in balaclavas who set off fireworks and threw them at police, causing officers to retreat.

Chairman Bill Fraser said: “‘We welcome the effort of the emergency services to make Bonfire Night safer.

“But this is a bigger problem that can only be solved by community action.

“We must deter youth from anti-social behaviour which is ruining the neighbourhood and cooperate with police to get rid of the drug gangs that groom young children.”

Religious leaders from Muslim, Sikh and Christian faiths are patrolling Pollokshields streets in the run up to November 5 to deter anti-social behaviour. This complements existing street work undertaken by local youth charities.