New Year's Eve illegal fireworks in Los Angeles rival those of Fourth of July

A couple wade into the ocean to view a fireworks display

Dec. 30, 2023 3 AM PT

Bright yellow, red and blue lights burst high across the L.A. sky. The baritone booms of M-80s mix with the staccato snap of firecrackers. Move over, Fourth of July — the New Year’s holiday is encroaching on your illegal fireworks extravaganza status.

Fire departments throughout the region, including Los Angeles city and county, Long Beach and Pasadena, are bracing for a midnight onslaught of illegal fireworks Dec. 31 and warning residents of the dangers and consequences of shooting them off. Air quality officials are monitoring for unhealthful particulates. Dog owners are planning comfort rooms for their spooked pets.

“Typically, we see some fireworks larger than what some professionals do in some of our neighborhoods,” said Lisa Derderian, spokesperson for the city of Pasadena, which is in the New Year’s spotlight as the host city for the Rose Parade and Rose Bowl game.

While midnight booms — including illegally firing guns into the air — have long been the dangerous scourge of New Year’s Eve in Los Angeles, illegal, home-ignited fireworks displays have exponentially increased in recent years, city and fire officials said.

And they blame the pandemic.

Leading into Dec. 31, 2020, officials fearing COVID-19 “superspreader” gatherings told people to stay home. Celebrants with little else to do turned to shooting off more fireworks than usual to ring in the new year. The same occurred in 2021, giving birth to a new trend.

Although New Year’s parties and large gatherings are back, the practice is lingering. Fire officials have seen a significant increase in fireworks displays this week and expect a surge of crackles and bursts at the midnight passage into 2023.

“We see them all over the place,” said California Department of Forest and Fire Prevention Battalion Chief Richard Cordova, warning that just like on the Fourth of July, setting off New Year’s fireworks carries the same risks, including fires, injuries and pets running away scared.

The South Coast Air Quality Management District has also seen the unhealthful trend. In 2020 it warned fireworks would create unhealthful air. Older adults, young children and people with lung disease were especially susceptible to the bad air, according to the agency.

This week, the district ordered a stop to wood-buring fireplaces and will be monitoring the air, prepared to issue new warnings if needed.

Many residents are also annoyed with the winter pyrotechnics.

“It’s a nightmare because you have people shooting off fireworks from the corners of the streets and in front of my house all night, but you never see these people clean up,” said 71-year-old retiree Tony Marquez of Boyle Heights. “There’s just trash everywhere.”

In the last few New Year’s, residents have taken to the streets in the days before and after Jan. 1 to discharge “bombs” and improvised fireworks, Marquez said. His neighborhood is “filled with trash and smoke” the following morning.

Marquez said the poor air quality makes for labored breathing during his daily trek around the rubberized 1.4-mile path that surrounds famed Evergreen Cemetery. The routine helps soothe the arthritis in his right knee, first diagnosed in 2008.

He now spends a fair amount of his time knocking away discarded projectiles with his feet or a wooden cane.

“It’s also the neighborhood dogs who have to deal with this,” Marquez said.

At Heavenly Pet Resort in Temple City, manager Thomas Mendoza’s New Year’s Eve plans include turning the volume “way up” on soothing spa music to calm dog and cats.

“People celebrate by shooting fireworks, guns, M-80s and other things that are really loud and do bother the pets,” Mendoza said. “So we do what we can to distract them. ... I don’t know if it’s gotten worse the last few years, but it’s louder and affects the animals.”

Warning against firework dangers has become a persistent admonishment, with additional concerns in December, fire officials said.

“Now our message is broad, for year-round,” Cordova said. “Year-round we’re confiscating fireworks.”

Sky rockets, cherry bombs, M-80s, and anything that blasts into the sky are illegal across California, but some jurisdictions allow for the use of “safe and sane” fireworks. However, California law allows for the sale of “safe and sane” fireworks only in the weeks before July 4. Their sale is illegal for the rest of the year.

That means “safe and sane” fireworks set off on New Year’s Eve were probably bought in the summer and stored for months, officials said. All other fireworks — such as those that shoot into the air and are prevalent on July 4 and New Year’s Eve — were probably bought out of state and smuggled in.

There’s no law against storing legally purchased fireworks for months, Cordova said, but there are definitely safety concerns about storing explosive material. Improperly stored fireworks can become unstable and unpredictable when used.

Cal Fire estimates that in 2022, fireworks were responsible for more than $25 million in property loss. Each fiscal year, the agency seizes more than 220,000 pounds of mostly illegal fireworks that need to be disposed of.

“There’s no sale of [‘safe and sane’] fireworks this time of year,” said Craig Little, spokesperson for the Los Angeles County Fire Department. “Wherever they’re getting them from, they’re more than likely illegal.”

Numbers on how many firework-related calls the agency responds to at the end of the year were not immediately available.

“All we can do is monitor,” Little said. “There are a ton of people who still choose to make things go bang on New Year’s Eve.”

Fireworks are still far more popular on July 4, but for Los Angeles County Fire Department officials, New Year’s messaging now echoes the Fourth of July, Little said.

“Leave all fireworks to the professionals,” he said.

In Long Beach, police are increasing “high-visibility” New Year’s Eve patrols to monitor for illicit fireworks, drunk driving and other safety calls, a spokesperson said. Under the city’s municipal code, property owners can be cited as much as $20,000 if fireworks are found to be discharged on their property.

Pasadena has a similar law, which can mean jail time and a fine of up to $50,000 for property owners. The city expects hundreds of thousands of visitors for the Rose Parade and Rose Bowl game on Jan. 1, with police already in “all hands on deck” mode, but Derderian said fireworks on New Year’s Eve add to the work.

“We do see fireworks, and we do have police and fire patrolling for the 24-hour period leading up to the parade,” she said. “Illegal fires and fireworks, unfortunately every year we do find that.”

Marquez said he believes more fireworks are being set off during New Year’s celebrations now than in the previous decade.

“In Boyle Heights, they fire up fireworks for the Dodgers or if the soccer team wins,” he said. “This is just another reason to do the same.”