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Illegal fireworks on New Year's Eve on December 30 (in Berlin-Schoeneberg)
Photo: Paul Zinken / dpa
The Berlin police are preparing for an eventful night.
"Again and again there are attacks on emergency services and injuries caused by fireworks," a police spokeswoman told SPIEGEL.
"We're expecting a busy night."
More than 1,000 additional officers are deployed in Berlin.
They mainly support colleagues in the restricted zones at Alexanderplatz, in the Steinmetzkiez and around the Moabit correctional facility.
Fireworks are not allowed there.
Pedestrians set off illegal rockets and firecrackers
Riots broke out on Thursday.
Around 150 passers-by illegally set off rockets and firecrackers around a street in Berlin-Schoeneberg.
On New Year's Eve, around 30 people came together again and threw firecrackers on the street in the Steinmetzkiez until the police arrived.
Police officers were thrown at with pyrotechnics, one officer was slightly injured, reports the spokeswoman for the Berlin police.
There were two arrests.
A bus on line M48 had to brake suddenly after a 16-year-old threw firecrackers on Potsdamer Strasse - nobody was injured.
The Berlin fire brigade also provides more than 1,400 additional emergency services, as there are always serious injuries during operations on New Year's Eve.
For the first time, some of them are wearing body cams to better document incidents.
Felix Martens, Managing Director of the Federal Association of Pyrotechnics and Fireworks (BVPK) told SPIEGEL that interest in fireworks was higher this year than it had been for a long time.
"The demand is incredible," says Martens.
"At some discounters, everything was largely sold out on the first day of sale."
The situation is similar with specialist retailers.
"Many shops closed early yesterday because everything was gone."
4000 euros for rockets and batteries
According to media reports, pyrotechnics fans stood in a shop on Berliner Allee for up to 13 hours in the cold on Wednesday evening to buy firecrackers for New Year's Eve at the start of sales.
A waiting passer-by reported to the "Berliner Zeitung" that he wanted to spend 4,000 euros on rockets and batteries.
Due to the corona pandemic, the sale of fireworks had been banned for the past two years.
Officially, fireworks are only allowed from 6 p.m. on New Year's Eve.
But even in the run-up to this year, there had been serious incidents in connection with fireworks.
Millions in damage after alleged arson
A supermarket in Bergfelde in the district of Oberhavel caught fire on Wednesday evening.
The damage is estimated at two million.
Two apartment buildings had to be evacuated, three people were slightly injured.
According to initial police findings, a group of four boys used pyrotechnics to cause a fire in the shopping trolley shelter, as reported by the dpa.
The police are investigating on suspicion of arson.
On Thursday afternoon, pyrotechnics were thrown at an officer in Neukölln and injured her ear.
In Neukölln and Charlottenburg, football fans blocked several streets in Berlin and threw pyrotechnics at cars and officials after Morocco reached the semi-finals of the World Cup.
An investigation is underway for particularly serious breaches of the peace, dangerous bodily harm and violations of the Weapons and Explosives Act and damage to motor vehicles, as the dpa reports.
lal/dpa
