Driving out evil New Year's spirits is a matter of individual tastes.

For some it can be achieved with nothing more than a few boxes of sparklers and handful of ladyfingers.

For others — such as the 40 or more family and friends that crowded around the carport at 2223 Ahe Place in Palolo last night — the spirits require a blowout on a whole other level.

The celebrants' ages ranged from Kirra Kawai, 2, to family patriarch Richard Tanaka, 85.

In the words of Laura Lea Toyama, whose parents, Richard and Eleanor Tanaka, own the home — it's "what began as a small family New Year's get-together three decades or so ago, and then got completely out of hand."

That heightened tradition kicked in about 15 years ago when Toyama's brother-in-law, Kevin "Big Pyro" Kawai, 37, ramped up the incandescence and decibel count to the eye-popping and ear-ringing outer limits.

Kawai admits that what happens outside the carport every New Year's Eve is "kinda sorta" the main event along the narrow street on which the house is located.

"Every year kids get burned and stuff, but every year we try to get more safe," he said. These days there's an increased emphasis on safety, he said. Basically, it's all an elaborate excuse to have a great time with relatives and acquaintances, drink a little beer, and watch about $2,000 worth of fireworks go up in smoke.

While Kawai and his 6-year-old nephew, Travis Toyama — better known on these occasions as "Little Pyro" — were getting things warmed up in the street with some flares, crackers and fountains, the women were setting up a feast inside.

The younger Pyro, clad in earmuffs and safety goggles, knelt down to delicately torch what soon became a loud, wheezing flash of colorful cracks and sparks.

Dashing back to the carport the boy let out a shriek of joy. He was joined by numerous other younger boys and girls in the family, laughing, lighting, and running in some more or less organized chaos.

In the meantime, Kawai's uncle, Ronald Horimoto, 60, was busy sweeping up piles of red firecracker rubbish and marveling at the recent invention of "paperless firecrackers" — which supposedly leave no paper residue.

They do, actually, said Horimoto, who attended these family get-togethers for decades. But there's much less of it.

"Because of them we only have about one and a half large garbage bags of rubbish after it's all over," Horimoto shouted above the hissing, whistling explosions all around him. "Used to be we'd have seven or eight garbage bag loads."

What's changed in family fireworks extravaganzas over the years? More people and less rubbish, according to Horimoto.

Earlier, as the sun went down, all pyrotechnics momentarily came to a halt as the whole gang gathered inside the house, joined hands and offered a prayer of thanks. Then, everyone loaded up paper plates of food and retired to their various safety zones to eat.

Meanwhile, Kawai and company — mostly the men and boys of the gathering — were back on Ahe Place lighting up whizbangs, torpedoes, pinwheels, bombs, flares, fountains, and fireblasters of seemingly infinite variety.

At one point, as flaming fountains roared at one end of the carport, an explosive blast at the other was so loud it touched off a chorus of neighborhood car alarms — which only added to the mayhem and delight.

"That chased out every evil spirit in the neighborhood," screamed Kawai.

Plans called for the frenzy to reach a tremendous crescendo at midnight when Kawai and his pals would fire up about eight stringers of 10,000 firecrackers each, along with any other fuse-bearing bang-bang they could get their hands on.

Why do they do it?

"It's fun — it excites the kids," shouted Kawai. "Yeah," he said a moment later, with a broad grin, "I'm a kid at heart! Exactly!"

And off he went in pursuit of more evil spirits.

Reach Will Hoover at whoover@honoluluadvertiser.com.