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California residents who lit illegal fireworks over the July 4 holiday may be in for a nasty surprise in the mail thanks to covert fire department operations.

A number of California cities, including Sacramento, have begun using drones to locate people shooting off illegal fireworks. From Wednesday to Saturday night, the Sacramento Fire Department’s special fireworks task force patrolled the streets with unmarked cars and drones, focusing on neighborhoods where they’ve had prior complaints. Task force officers and the drones took photos of the illegal activity, and within 30 days the property owner where the fireworks were used could receive a fine in the mail.

  • Admiral Patrick@dubvee.orgOPEnglish
    398·
    1 day ago

    I miss the days when the obnoxious fireworks were illegal in my state :sigh:

    This year, Sacramento upped the fine to $1,000 for the first firework, $2,500 for the second and $5,000 per firework after that. If you lit a firework on city property, such as a park or a school, the fine goes up to $10,000 each. There’s no limit to how many fines you can be issued.

    “If we see multiple fireworks being used at a single property, we can stack the violations based upon how many fireworks they’re using,” SFD Fire Marshal Jason Lee told KCRA. “So, it could be thousands of dollars per location.”

    Hell yeah. Keep me awake till 3 am with your constant “boom boom boom”, that’s gonna cost ya. The only thing that would make this story better is if after a certain threshold, they bring in armed Predator drones.

    If I’m coming off a bit cranky, it’s because I’ve barely slept in 4 days.

    • bassomitron@lemmy.worldEnglish
      52·
      1 day ago

      Have you called the police? They fucking suck, but even in legal states they still have city ordinances that don’t allow lighting off fireworks all night long. I know in the last city I lived in that allowed them, you had to stop by 2230 and they typically enforced it on every day that wasn’t the 4th of July. The city went on to eventually ban fireworks year-round except for NYE and a 2-week window around the 4th.

      My point is, if your city doesn’t have these types of ordinances, you should rally local support to get them implemented. I guarantee you there are tons of people who feel the same as you about assholes lighting off big booms at 1am.

      • Texas_Hangover@sh.itjust.works
        11·
        9 hours ago

        Pussies. Texas recently increased our legal firework selling holidays to 11 or some shit lol. We still have to go to Oklahoma or Missouri to get the best shit tho. Or roll our own.

      • Admiral Patrick@dubvee.orgOPEnglish
        5·
        24 hours ago

        Unincorporated suburb, so no ordinance other than just being shitty, inconsiderate neighbors.

        Best (only?) case would be a county ordinance.

        • bassomitron@lemmy.worldEnglish
          23·
          23 hours ago

          Ahh, damn… Yeah, that sucks. Do you guys have HOAs, at least? I know they get a bad wrap, but properly run HOAs can be a large boon for unincorporated neighborhoods.

          • Admiral Patrick@dubvee.orgOPEnglish
            3·
            23 hours ago

            Nope, and that was one of the selling points when I bought the place years ago lol.

            Plus, the HOA zone would have to be massive since sound travels far and wide when those things fire off.