New Zealand First To Celebrate 2018 With Spectacular Fireworks

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New Zealand welcomed in 2018 with a spectacular five minute firework display, from Auckland’s Sky Tower.

Auld Langs Syne will have been cracked out and hopefully at least one person played Man’s Not Hot at exactly 11:57.30pm so at the strike of midnight, Big Shaq can be heard saying; ‘The ting goes skrrraaaa!’, ensuring 2018 was kicked off the right way.

Although the last bit is yet to be confirmed….

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Multi-coloured lights exploded over the Auckland harbour as New Zealand celebrated being one of the first countries to ring in the New Year.

The Sky City casino and event centre was the centre of the action as a giant clock counted down to midnight before the sky was filled with lights and explosions to mark the welcoming of 2018.

Samoa was the first country to enter 2018 at 10.00am GMT this morning an hour before New Zealand.

Sydney and the east of Australia set off their fireworks at 1.00pm GMT.

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As the closest nations to the International Date Line, Samoa and co will be bringing the party in a whole 12 hours earlier than their neighbours just an hour’s flight away in American Tonga, The Telegraph writes – so if you fancy two New Year’s next year, and we hope it’s not so bad you’ll have to, you know what to do.

Also turning up fashionably late to 2018 is Baker Island, an American held atoll located almost halfway between Australia and Hawaii.

However the island is uninhabited, which begs the question: if the ball falls at midnight and there’s no one to hear it, does it make a New Year?

If you want to keep an eye on 2018 arriving on the scene around the world, it’ll be rocking up in Toyko at 3pm, Beijing and Hong Kong at 4pm, 8pm in Dubai, New York at 5am and Los Angeles 8am. All times GMT, obvs.

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Understandably, it’s New Year’s Eve, so it’s rather quiet on the Twitter front:

However you’re celebrating this year, stay safe, have fun, and please drink responsibly.

Tim Horner

Tim Horner is a sub-editor at UNILAD. He graduated with a BA Journalism from University College Falmouth before most his colleagues were born. A previous editor of adult mags, he now enjoys bringing the tone down in the viral news sector.