FIREWORKS BAN NOBODY OBEYS
In run-up to Halloween rockets are sold openly on social media, with fewer than 100 convictions for illegal possession in a decade
ILLEGAL fireworks are being openly sold on social media in the countdown to Halloween as new figures reveal gardaí have convicted fewer than 100 people for rocketrelated offences in the past decade.
Young people are being targeted on TikTok, Instagram and Facebook with a vast array of fireworks, which start at pocket-money prices and offer discounts for multiple purchases.
It took the Irish Mail on Sunday just 30 minutes to find a seller who was willing to travel to an agreed location in north Dublin the following day to drop off fireworks.
When our reporter asked if it was easy to get away with carrying fireworks, they replied: ‘All the guards do is take them off you.’
Figures obtained by the MoS show An Garda Síochána has responded to 1,711 fireworks incidents since 2014 and seized 1,160 fireworks but have only arrested 157 people.
‘All the guards do is to take them off you’
The force has seized €205,197 worth of fireworks, including €25,510 already this year, but has issued only 34 fines.
On TikTok, it takes seconds to find dozens of videos where sellers post videos of their stock of illegal fireworks with some offering nationwide delivery.
Some can be bought for as little as between €5 and €7 while more powerful rockets with names such as Metallic Massacre and Supreme Strike cost between €35 and €90.
One seller was offering more than 60 different fireworks, with their most expensive firework, the War Machine 224 Shot, costing €500.
Using Halloween to push sales, TikTok viewers are encouraged to get their orders in quickly as daily videos are posted by the same accounts to push the message that ‘stock is flying out’.
On Facebook, there are public groups set up solely for the sale of illegal fireworks. These groups, which are open for anyone to join, have hundreds of members and allow people to message sellers directly to purchase fireworks.
One Dublin-based Facebook group has had 52 new members join in the past week.
Instagram sellers are posting pictures and videos of fireworks and encouraging followers to privately message the account to agree a price.
Across social media, the most commonly sold fireworks are selection boxes which include a number of different fireworks packaged together and sold for €50.
Aside from online sales, just across the border in Cullaville, Co. Armagh, fireworks are being sold legally and openly, including to customers from the South.
An 087 number listed on one roadside advertisement even assures southern buyers that €1 is equal to £1 at his shop.
Dublin Fire Brigade Assistant Chief Greg O’Dwyer, who has worked as a firefighter for 35 years, told the MoS: ‘Adults are travelling up to the border with Northern Ireland [where fireworks are legal], to Newry and they’re selling selection boxes of fireworks for £50. You can buy a selection of bangers and rockets and cartwheels, and they are really dangerous.
‘Nobody knows where they were made, nobody knows the quality systems that were in place in the factories where they were produced and because of that they are totally unpredictable and go off spontaneously.’
Mr O’Dwyer said he had personally responded to numerous callouts for firework incidents and seen children suffer life-changing injuries
‘Nobody knows the quality of the products’
as a result. ‘They have gone off in children’s pockets spontaneously just from friction.
‘I’ve seen really severe burns to a child’s neck. I’ve seen fingers partially blown off by bangers in their
hands and I’ve seen several eye injuries.
‘The other danger about fireworks is that people will bring them along to bonfires, which are also illegal, and they throw the fireworks onto the bonfire and then they shoot out like missiles and strike people in the eye.’
Dublin Fire Brigade expects to receive between 200 and 250 calls, alongside the ambulance service, related to fireworks on Halloween night itself.
Because black-market fireworks have no warranty or guarantee of quality, Mr O’Dwyer said it is often seemingly innocuous back garden fireworks displays that go badly wrong.
He told the MoS: ‘We’ve seen several occasions of rockets firing out of control going into kitchens or through windows.
‘I’ve seen kitchens on fire, a bedroom on fire from adults lighting fireworks outside the front of their house or in the back garden and they should know better. They are not illegal for no reason.’
However, Dublin Fire Brigade says that while you will hear a lot of fireworks going off this weekend in your local area, the number of injuries is falling thanks to an increase in the number of organised displays by local authorities.
Mr O’Dwyer said: ‘We’ve definitely seen a downward trend on fires and injury activity over the last five years. Compared to what it was 10 years ago, it was a lot, lot worse.’
Last year, gardaí responded to 158 fireworks incidents, a drop from the 186 recorded in 2021.
However, in 2020, when there were no organised Halloween fireworks displays due to Covid social distancing rules, incidents spiralled to 315. That year, gardaí seized €42,939 worth of fireworks – their highest annual total in the past 10 years.
For Mr O’Dwyer the message to those thinking of buying illegal fireworks is simple: ‘If you’d seen what I’d seen, you wouldn’t be buying them.
‘There’s no need for this any more, there are so many properly organised events. People should go and enjoy their Halloween instead of ending up in the emergency department.’