This fourth of July I was lucky enough to attend what was claimed to be the largest fireworks display from [some city I can't recall] in Florida and [another city I can't recall] in Texas. Pretty big claim so it was lucky I was in town. Now you've heard about patriotism and stuff from enough people already so I'll skip to the interesting part.

I had purchased a sound level meter that measures how loud things are in decibels. I wanted to use it to objectively complain about my neighbor's music, but after that never happened I've had no reason to use it. However I wondered how loud a fireworks show was.

I was on the beach adjacent to the beach having the display. So that display wasn't loud however there were fireworks being launched nearby and I recorded those sounds.

Data recorded on a windy beach.

65-70 decibells background noise

80-87 decibells most nearby fireworks

100-105 decibells loudest close fireworks