Man killed playing "war" with fireworks on Fourth of July

CHERAW, South Carolina -- Fourth of July celebrations turned deadly in Cheraw, South Carolina.

A man was killed while playing what his friends call a war with fireworks. The game involves shooting fireworks at one another, WSOC-TV reports.

"Every year we have war, like we stand out here, we shoot at each other having a good time," Stephon Harrington said.

This year, the fireworks war turned deadly.

M.C. Gallion III was killed when police say he loaded a mortar shell the wrong way into the launch tube and it blasted out of the base of the tube, and hit him.

Marquis Pryam, 14, was watching from his front porch.

"It didn't come out like it was supposed to. It just exploded right in his hands, and he was trembling, and he just fell right there, like straight down," Pryam said.

For Pryam, the whole scene was terrifying.

"Everybody just crowded around him. I just saw blood coming out of his mouth," he said.

A neighbor tried to do CPR, but Gallion died a short time later.

Police say another person lost part of his hand playing the same game about an hour earlier.