Revelers fly, float, march in NYC
Macy’s presents its 91st Thanksgiving parade, and though security is tight, holiday cheer prevails
The 91st annual Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade streamed through New York City on Thursday, featuring the event’s customary colorful balloons, bands and floats. Authorities
doubled down on security for the spectacle in a year that’s been marked by attacks on outdoor festivities.
For millions of Americans, the parade is as big a part of Thanksgiving as turkey and football.
The parade, one of the nation’s biggest outdoor holiday events, came weeks after a deadly truck attack killed eight people in Lower Manhattan. As a result, there was a tight layer of security, including officers with assault weapons and portable radiation detectors among the crowds, sharpshooters on rooftops and sand- filled city sanitation trucks poised as barriers to traffic at every cross street.
“A happy and joyful Thanksgiving from our family to yours,” New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio wrote in a tweet.
Paul Seyforth, 76, flew in from Denver to spend his 50th wedding anniversary in New York and see this year’s parade. “Not a lot’s changed — the balloons, the bands, the floats — and that’s the good thing,” said Seyforth, 76.
The parade was largely incidentand accident- free, save for a balloon that popped after blowing into a tree. Police quickly cleared the deflated candy cane, and the parade continued. No one was injured.