STLPR0%
A drone will help Kirkwood police tackle fireworks violations on July Fourth 37%
By Annisyn Krebs-Carr0%
6/30/2026, 10:00:00 AM
BS Summary: This article contains 19 faulty reasoning types, including Availability Heuristic, Appeal to Authority, and Red Herring, with Hasty Generalization as the most egregious example at 19.3% saturation with 68 hits. Analysis detected 479 faulty-reasoning hits from 353 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 43.4% and a BS Rank of 37% (13,914 of 21,886 articles). This article is better (less manipulative) than 63.60% of the article peer group.
As the Fourth of July approaches, the Kirkwood Police Department has come up with a new way to deal with fireworks violations: a drone.
Police get complaints every year about residential fireworks—which are illegal in Kirkwood—being discharged, said Gary Baldridge, the department’s community service officer.
Responding to all of them takes a lot of time, and Baldridge said using the drone will help improve response times.
The drone has a loudspeaker attached to it that will play a prerecorded message reminding the resident of the violation.
According to the department’s Facebook post, the message is: “Attention.
This is the Kirkwood Police Department Drone Unit.
The discharge of fireworks is prohibited within the city of Kirkwood.
Cease all fireworks activity immediately.
Failure to comply will result in officers being dispatched to your location, and enforcement action may be taken."
If the activity continues, Baldridge said an officer may be dispatched.
He said it’s essentially just having another person on duty who only handles fireworks.
“Sometimes our officers are handling more severe … calls for service that require a different response than a simple firework violation,” he said.
Some people have expressed concern that the drone is a violation of privacy on the department’s Facebook post.
As of Monday afternoon, there were 888 comments on the post, with most commenters against the use of the drone.
Baldridge said that he is aware of the comments on Facebook and that, to his knowledge, the department has received no phone calls or emails pushing back on the plan.
The Kirkwood drone program has been in place for a few years and is typically used for matters that officers on the ground can’t handle.
Baldridge said the drone can get to an area faster than an officer can.
The department uses the drone when a suspect is trying to elude the police and to respond to reports of missing people and erratic driving, Baldrige said.
He said that several officers are certified to operate the drone and that the department meets all requirements to operate one.
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70%flagged-word coverageGary Baldridge
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