Emergency crews arrived at a chaotic and horrifying scene in a Honolulu neighborhood after a large New Year’s firework toppled over after being lit, igniting a fiery, shrapnel-strewn explosion that killed three people and injured more than 20 others, several of them critically.
Two women died at the scene and a third woman died at a hospital, authorities said Wednesday, as they pleaded with people to abandon their New Year’s tradition of setting off fireworks across the city. Officials promised tougher penalties for illegal fireworks.
Hawaii Gov. Josh Green graphically described the deaths at a news conference Wednesday to emphasize the potential danger of fireworks. “We’re talking about the worst possible injuries in the war zone that took their lives.”
Some of the more than 20 people taken to hospitals with serious burns and shrapnel wounds included children, said officials, who had not yet publicly identified any victims, including those killed.
Police were investigating whether charges against the person who set off the fireworks near midnight were warranted, Honolulu Police Chief Arthur Logan said.
The blast happened in a three-story home with a carport on the lower level. Piles of debris including bundles of black fireworks mortars could be seen in front of the house in daylight on Wednesday.
The explosion shattered windows across the street. It happened when a lit bundle of mortar-style aerial fireworks, called a “cake,” tipped or fell off a table and shot sideways into boxes of additional fireworks, which then exploded.
The rounds of the cake could be separated but had been lit as a bundle of 50, part of what officials said was tens of thousands of dollars worth of home fireworks.
Emergency crews arrived but had to triage — separating and treating victims with the worst injuries first — several houses away because of parked cars and crowds on the streets, said Honolulu Emergency Services Department Director Dr. Jim Ireland.
Some people nearby continued to set off fireworks even as blast victims were taken to hospitals, officials said.
The neighborhood is near Honolulu International Airport and a joint US Air Force and Navy base and a little more than 2 miles (3.22 kilometers) east of the USS Arizona Memorial, which honors sailors who died in the attack on Pearl Harbor, that drew the United States into World War II.
“I’ve been in EMS for over 30 years and this is probably one of the worst calls I’ve ever been on in terms of the sheer tragedy and the number of patients and the severity of the injuries,” Ireland said at an earlier press conference .
A fourth person was killed in another fireworks explosion elsewhere on Oahu, officials said. At least four other serious injuries occurred in unrelated fireworks accidents overnight.
Social media posts overnight showed fireworks being set off over large areas of Honolulu, although sparklers, fountains and aerial fireworks are illegal and a permit is required to set off fireworks, according to the Honolulu Fire Department.
“We are angry, frustrated and deeply saddened by this unnecessary loss of life and suffering. It is a tragic way to start the new year,” said Mayor Rick Blangiardi. “No one should have to endure such pain because of a reckless and illegal activity.”
Green said he was looking into whether new penalties, including a felony charge for possessing large fireworks, are needed to curb fireworks in Hawaii.
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Mines reported from Cheyenne, Wyoming. John Hanna contributed to this report from Topeka, Kansas.
