S.F. fireworks complaints blew up in 2020

In most ways, San Francisco felt quieter last year — but not when it came to fireworks. Whether because everything else was so subdued or because people were actually setting more fireworks off, the city’s pyrotechnics generated nearly three times more complaints in 2020 than they did in 2019.

The Chronicle analyzed the San Francisco Police Department’s calls for service data to determine how many fireworksrelated calls the department received from 2018 through June 2021.

We found that people made 463 fireworksrelated calls in 2020, up from just 158 in 2019. And while calls for all three complete years we examined were concentrated in the traditionally fireworksheavy months of June and July, 2020 also had more fireworks complaints than 2019 and 2018 in most other months as well.

Unsurprisingly, the most common day for fireworks complaints is July 4. Thirty nine complaints were made on July 4, 2020, nearly twice as many as any other day that year. Complaints also spike slightly around the New Year. Of the top 30 days with the most fireworksrelated calls over 2018, 2019 and 2020, Dec. 31 and Jan. 1 were the only days not in the months of June or July.

The call data also show that fireworks complains were particularly high in June 2020, near the beginning of the pandemic and during the protests following George Floyd’s death. In all the other years we looked at, complaints peaked in July. In 2020, they were highest in June.

With San Francisco fully reopened and Fourth of July on the horizon, complaints appear to be declining in 2021, though they are not back to prepandemic levels. Through June 19 of this year, people have made 105 fireworksrelated calls to police — down from 136 by that date in 2020.

Santiago Mejia / The Chronicle 2020 Neighborhood fireworks were big throughout San Francisco last year.