Image: Emmanuel Van't Padje / Emmanuel Van't Padje with his dog, Phillip.

By Joonha 'Jonah' Jung - BCIT Journalism student

Fireworks discharge

Fireworks discharge in Abbotsford causes chain reaction of tragic events for local pet owner

Nov 5, 2025 | 9:05 AM

ABBOTSFORD — On the night of Halloween, as trick-or-treaters went from door to door to grab candies and chocolate bars, Emmanuel Van’t Padje in Abbotsford was desperately looking for his dog, which had run out of the house.

The Abbotsford pet owner says his pet Phillip, frightened of fireworks, ran through the opened dog door, went through the fence, and got hit by a vehicle.

The dog was eventually put down after being sent to the hospital.

“They launched fireworks into above my house and yard. So that obviously spooked Philip,” Van’t Padje said. “When anything is scared, when anything is a heightened emotions, they can do things that you don’t expect them to be able to do,” said the dog owner.

Image: Emmanuel Van’t Padje / Phillip, Van’t Padje’s dog.

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Van’t Padje argues that there can be other options for the safety of pets, such as drone shows.

The majority of cities in B.C., including Abbotsford, have banned the sales of fireworks and firecrackers, only allowing permitted discharge. However, people set them off to celebrate, leading to property damage and fires sometimes.

Van’t Padje argues that drones cause less damage than fireworks. “There’s no noise pollution, there’s no air pollution, there’s no danger,” he said.

Aleem Kanjii, the chief advocacy officer for the Canadian National Fireworks Association, says drones are not a good alternative because they remind some people of active warfare.

Alexandra Protopopova, the UBC Applied Animal Biology Program Advisor, expresses concerns about the balance between the benefits and costs of using fireworks.

“What kind of was potentially just a one-time happy moment for a couple of people or maybe even for hundreds of people, it could be a long-lasting traumatic experience for many animals,” she said.

Protopopova says all dogs are prone to the sounds of fireworks.

“Could we even engineer fireworks that are not that loud? Could we have drone shows? ….. Maybe we can have that celebration, but without that harm in terms of sound,” she said.

She worries that the experience can make owners deal with negative impacts, such as their pets refusing to leave their homes.

“My dogs love fireworks”

In Vancouver, Mony Sodhi, the owner of M&M Fireworks and also a pet owner, says his dogs showed a different kind of emotion than stress or anxiety as fireworks exploded.

“At one point, I had four dogs in my house, and I was lighting fireworks when it was permitted outside. My dogs got used to it. They would just bark here and there, run around out of excitement,” Sodhi said.

As a pet owner who raised lizards, cats, and dogs, he says responsibility lies in the pet owners’ hands to keep pets distant from fireworks, as parents do with kids.

He worries that being too close to fireworks can lead to dogs chasing them down or biting them.

His dogs would hop onto the window or the balcony to watch the lights. “It almost mesmerized them like it would a human being. So I thought that was cute and adorable,” said Sodhi.

The city of Vancouver introduced the ban on the use, discharge, and retail of fireworks back in 2021 due to an increased number of fire-related incidents and property damage.

According to a motion submitted to the municipality in 2023, there had been about 19 fires caused by fireworks annually that led to $5.6 million in property damage from 2016 to 2020.

This led to fireworks being restricted to community events, but only with a permit given to certified technicians by the Vancouver Fire and Rescue Services.

Fireworks, a tool for celebration

Sodhi says the ban is “unnecessary,” saying fireworks made holidays such as Diwali, Vasaki, Persian New Year, New Year’s Day, and Canada Day “awesome, entertaining, and fun.”

However, he says tighter control is needed as there are irresponsible people who discharge fireworks at properties or people.

“I believe they should be a little bit more strict, enforce rules a little bit more, but through policies. But to just take it away, ridiculous,” said Sodhi.

Kanji says fireworks bring communities together for celebrations such as Diwali and Halloween.

“They have sacred rights and customs in their faith that have included the use of fireworks for Diwali, and this is all related to that whole notion of hope,” he said.

Kanji explains that using fireworks on Halloween started when British immigrants celebrated Guy Fawkes Day which marked the failure to blow up the English parliament.

“It’s steeped in rich tradition that not only supported ethnic local retailers, but also held to the values of rich cultural tradition that immigrants held very close to years ago,” he said.

Possible Alternatives?

Back in Abbotsford, Van’t Padje says, despite the cultural significance of fireworks, the environment should be controlled. He suggests there are multiple ways to celebrate Diwali besides fireworks.

He explains that setting off fireworks shows a lack of consideration for people who have to wake up early.

“A scheduled showing from the government in a place that is avoidant of residences and people generally, so a public area, a park, somewhere where there’s no danger for things.”

Van’t Padje says he is planning on creating an animal sanctuary dedicated to Phillip, whom he adopted from Mexico.

“I also just want to become an advocacy group for the banning of fireworks provincially and hopefully in the end, just countrywide, because like I said, they’re just unnecessary,” he said.

The Abbotsford dog owner said he was an hour away from home when he heard that his dog had gone missing. The Abbotsford dog owner said his dog “meant everything” and comforted him through tough times.

“If illegal fireworks were not used on Halloween, Philip would be alive still. And he deserved to be alive still.”

Reader’s note: Jonah Jung is a journalism student at the British Columbia Institute of Technology.