Fireworks vendors are springing up all around the area for the holiday weekend, but don't light off your roman candles just yet...
A Michigan law only allows fireworks to be used around a national holiday, and memorial day will give firework lovers three days to enjoy all their pyrotechnics.
"The laws permit us to have fireworks and actually use them and shoot them on the day of, the day before, and the day after a holiday--and we have a huge holiday coming up, Memorial weekend," says Mike Crosby, a firework salesman in Lansing.
But it's not necessarily 72 straight hours during which you can launch fireworks. Some municipalities prohibit the use of fireworks between 1 AM and 8 AM, even on holidays.
"Local municipalities can enact an ordinance where it's actually illegal to shoot them off between one and eight in the morning," says Scott Wriggelsworth of the East Lansing police department.
That ordinance can help those who work early on Tuesday morning, so they won't have to endure the thunder of fireworks until the early hours. But if they do call the police, it's not guaranteed that they will see any justice.
"It's hard to enforce," says Wriggelsworth, "because we have to see them doing it as it happens."
So if you're using fireworks, be sure to be respectful of those around, especially late at night.
