Posted on: Thursday, January 3, 2002

Editorial
New Year's sparkled without fireworks orgy

For once, Honolulu didn't look like a war zone on Jan. 1. New Year's Eve set off plenty of revelry, but noticeably less noise and suffocating haze, to the relief of asthma sufferers and others with respiratory ailments.

So now that we know Hawai'i can successfully ring in the New Year without a gazillion fireworks, let's give a round of applause to a state permit law that requires people to pay $25 for the privilege of purchasing 5,000 fireworks.

We can't say for sure whether the permit law reduced the use of fireworks this year, but we suspect it played a role. It was a relatively peaceful First.

Compare that to Lima, Peru, where a firecracker sparked a weekend blaze that torched four blocks of tenements and shopping galleries and killed 290 people.

As a result, President Alejandro Toledo banned the production, importation and sale of fireworks, and promised to draft a law requiring up to 10 years in prison for those who violate the prohibition.

With care, Hawai'i won't have to get to that point. There's an ounce of prevention in our fireworks permit law.