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.
There was a drone (prop plane type, not quadcopter) flying over neighborhoods for a while on the 4th, wouldn’t surprise me if it was from the city to catch people. This being in Ohio.
Like, i get it; first few 4th of julys after I turned 18 i bought fireworks too, and it was fun. At a certain point the novelty wore off and it was stupid and dangerous, and i was literally blowing hundreds of dollars for no real reason.