I don’t want to rain on anyone’s parade, but I saw something last Thursday night that scared the bejeebees out of me.

Everybody loves a parade and local people are no different whether the parade is on Main Street Crenshaw or Fifth Avenue in New York City.

Young kids were jumping up and down awaiting the parade to begin in the cold night air common to December in the Delta. Many adults stayed out of the elements in their automobiles until the sirens could be heard or the flashing lights could be seen announcing the oncoming parade.

Floats consisting of decorated pickups, an occasional trailer, the City of Crenshaw’s tractor, and fire trucks added to the menu of entries. Marching bands from both North Panola and Rosa Fort Schools added music, march, bump and grind to the event helping to warm the blood of onlookers.

Candy was thrown from fire trucks and other entries and children along the Main Street parade route reached down to claim the treasure.

That’s when my fun ended.

Muscle-type cars with big engines, loud pipes and slick tires then came along doing burn-outs, spinning tires, just feet away from where youngsters had been reaching down picking up candy just moments before.

These high powered vehicles with their loud pipes making blinding smoke in some instances, reminded me of the accident in July of 2007 when in Selmer, Tennessee, a dragster spun out of control into a crowd at a parade there and killed six and injured 18 others standing beside the road watching the spectacle.

As with the accident in Selmer, there were no guardrails between the few hundred spectators along the Main Street parade route. One mechanical or human error could have meant serious injury or death anywhere along that parade route.

We can’t be prepared for every possible accident or disaster that may come along, but this type of entry should never be allowed in a parade especially where young children have been lured close to the roadway and raw power and sheet metal is only a small misstep away.

Somebody should be looking out for the public’s safety. The ball was dropped in Crenshaw Thursday night.