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Officials keep eye on fireworks stands
The countdown to the Fourth of July began with six retail firework stands opening for business Wednesday in McCook.
As shoppers scan the items looking for the best bang for their buck, others will be scrutinizing the shelves as well, but for another reason: looking for illegal fireworks.
Armed with a 12-page list of permissible fireworks, Deputy State Fire Marshal Michael Hoeft from North Platte, along with McCook Fire Chief Marc Harpham, will be checking the inventory of each fireworks store to make sure everything is legal, a process Hoeft said that can take up two hours.
"We go after the distributor, not the little guy," he said. If found, illegal fireworks are confiscated, with the distributor facing the possibility of losing their license for up to a year.
Although firework outlets may have no idea what is or is not legal this year, distributors are sent a letter in March warning them what is allowable, Hoeft said, so they have plenty of time to pull an item if necessary, he said.
"We're pushing the distributor to watch what they're sending to their people," he said.
Hoeft's first stop Wednesday was at 1/2 Price Fireworks, operated by the Peace Lutheran Church youth group. Packages of rockets, Roman candles and artillery shells were checked to see if the item name appeared on the list, with help from Harpham and fire department members Rick Metcalf and Mike Schoen-emann.
Perennial favorites among customers always seem to be smoke bombs and snakes, said Bill Traphagan, who was working with his youth group at 1/2 Price Fireworks.
"If you don't know what to get for kids, you can't go wrong with those," he said.
But don't expect to see any bottle rockets, cherry bombs or M-80s, which are illegal to sell in Nebraska, as well as nightime parachutes or artillery shells with more than six balls per tube. Safety tests have shown that tubes that project more than six tend to fall over, Harpham said. Any projectile that comes down "hot" is also illegal, as is transporting fireworks across state lines.
There have not been any firework-related injuries reported in McCook for several years, Harpham said.
He said he doesn't anticipate any problems this year as most people are fairly conscientious when doing their fireworks.
Yet Harpham still advised residents to stay on the alert and use caution because of dry and sometimes windy conditions.
And although it is permissible to light fireworks in McCook any time during the year, the McCook Police Department will respond to noise complaints, barring the Fourth of July.
After 1/2 Price Fireworks passed the inventory check with flying colors, Hoeft moved on to other stands in McCook while customers continued to mill about, filling their baskets and asking questions concerning fountain colors and comet size.
"You want to know what I want that I probably can't get?" a 5-year old boy asked his mother, pointing to "Parachute Invasion."
As the mother shook her head, the boy shrugged his shoulders and said, "I guess I'll just get some snakes and smoke bombs then."