DENVER — A million fans lined the streets Tuesday to celebrate the Denver Broncos’ Super Bowl 50 win over the Carolina Panthers. The parade, however, did draw some criticism from firefighters after players, spouses and children were seen riding on top of fire trucks.
The group of players traveled the parade route in a series of fire trucks. Denver fire truck No. 18 carried quarterback Payton Manning, John Elway, Annabelle Bowlen, the wife of owner Pat Bowlen, Demarcus Ware, Von Miller and more. In a Twitter video posted by the Denver Broncos, players can be seen standing, dancing and holding open bottles on top of Denver Fire Department trucks. The Denver Channel also posted a video to their Facebook page that showed Payton Manning’s daughter riding on top of a rig and waving to fans.
Fire trucks from neighboring departments were also transporting the Bronco’s parade entourage in hose beds and on roofs.
Burton Clark, a retired National Fire Academy Executive Fire Officer instructor, book author, 42-year fire veteran, operations chief during national disasters and also a FireRescue1 contributor, shared The Denver Channel’s video on his Facebook page with this caption:
“Are any fire service leaders going to tell the fire department it is in violation of NFPA safety standards and putting children at risk? If we can’t get seat belts right, how can we get the more complex behaviors correct? The 300+ firefighters who die due to no seat belts in the last 30 years missed the game and lost again because we did not remember them.”
We want to know: where do you stand on this issue?
Amazing turnout. #BroncosParade https://t.co/cq4zHNbInA
— Denver Broncos (@Broncos) February 9, 2016
PFM, your Super Bowl MVP Von Miller and DeMarcus Ware are on a fire truck with Annabel Bowlen. Broncos Country, the...
Posted by Denver7 News & The Denver Channel on Tuesday, February 9, 2016