Felonious Sparklers

Summer Hard Week 2

Image Credit: Troy Case

If you need evidence of the efficacy of government prohibition, look no further than the sky over Los Angeles this week.

All fireworks are illegal in this city, even the humble sparkler, that boring, seemingly harmless object, has become a criminal enterprise. Come Saturday, they may be arresting 7-year-olds along with your neighbors launching mortar shells and aerial repeaters until 1 AM.

The state takes all of this very seriously, at least on paper. Los Angeles seized 75 tons of illegal fireworks in Gardena earlier this year and 100,000 pounds in Commerce. Yet LA still lights up like a war zone for the better part of July because for every ton they grab, there is another sitting in some garage in Cudahy, waiting for its moment in the dark.

And despite regulators' best efforts to eliminate even legal fireworks shows, the city is replete with them. Professional pyrotechnics are incredible artists, with a great safety record, considering they launch weapons-grade rockets over populated areas.

And there are plenty of neighboring cities, like Lakewood or Lawndale, where “California Legal” or “Safe and Sane” fireworks are sold and may be used. They are sold from temporary stands plastered with bright posters, often run by charitable groups such as the Lions Club.

But maybe it’s the danger that keeps illegal fireworks coming back every year.

Growing up, illegal fireworks were abundant. We had the Mexican border a couple of hours south and the port five minutes away, and between the two of them, you could get anything, M-80s, seal controls, Black Cat firecrackers by the brick. My father and his legendary partner, Uncle Bob, once dropped a couple of bricks of firecrackers into a metal trash can in the middle of our street on the Fourth. I will never forget the sound, the never-ending, rapid-fire explosion inside that can, making it jump and dance like it had caught the Holy Spirit at a tent revival, my father and Uncle Bob standing around it like deacons for Ernest Angley.

Back then, enforcement was soft, and the lawbreaking didn’t go on all Summer long. Today, a pipeline runs through the desert to the coast. Drive 150 miles Northeast of Barstow, and you’ll hit Pahrump, Nevada, which may be the fireworks capital of the West. There is a store called Area 51 Fireworks that sells the things that fly, burst, burn, and scream. It’s across the state line, so it’s legal there. But if you drive your cache back into California, you’ve committed a crime, and the illegality drives the price up. A legal purchase in Nevada can sell for four times the price in LA, so suddenly your neighbor with an RV becomes a smuggler.

There are also organized networks of fireworks smugglers, leading to volatile stockpiles. In 2021, the LAPD attempted to destroy a large stash in South LA. The effort went horrifically wrong, injuring 17 people and nearly leveling the neighborhood. A government that wants to stop fireworks from arriving seemingly can’t even safely get rid of them.

By Sunday, thousands of people will end up in the country’s emergency rooms, many of them children. At least 1,000 of those injuries will be from those seemingly harmless sparklers.

As is its annual custom, the city just announced stricter enforcement of fireworks laws, prosecution even, as if this is the year their proclamation will hold.

But this weekend, the war of independence will rage on the streets and back alleys of Los Angeles. Stand on any hill and watch the rockets glare red, and you’ll realize the futility of the City’s proclamation.

xAP