INDIAN LAND, S.C. (WBTV) - “I’m stoked. I can’t wait,” Josh Peters said after buying fireworks today. “This is gonna be awesome.”

The Fourth of July is around the corner, but many people are already preparing for the excitement.

Fireworks are a huge part of this holiday and people surely have been stocking up. Carts full of the biggest and baddest fireworks left Phantom Fireworks in Indian Land today, but doctors are hoping it does not get so out of hand, that you end up losing one.

It is the most wonderful time of the year—at least for people who love fireworks.

”I think this is my fifth time coming here already this year and I just wanted one little item for my fireworks show on Saturday,” Eugene Jones said.

Some people are flocking down south from North Carolina to get the ones they want, all in the hopes that they will have a good time with family and friends.

”They’re not allowed in North Carolina so I had to come down here to get them,” one buyer said. “And now I’m bringing them back.”

”We’re gonna blow some stuff up,” Peters said. “Maybe blow the neighbors up. Maybe blow our hands off. But no, we are going to be super careful I swear to God. We are going to be. But we’re gonna have a good time.”

People have been coming in and out of the doors of Phantom Fireworkers with those huge fireworks down to the small sparklers, but doctors say even fireworks that small could be dangerous.

”We expect to see some firework injuries. We do every year,” Dr. Melissa Fenner, the Assistant Medical Director of the Emergency Medicine Department at Piedmont Medical Center, said.

In her 20 years, she has seen it all. Fenner said the hospital is bracing for what will be a busy night—expecting at least three people to show up with firework-related injuries.

”Singed fingers, burnt fingers. The worst of the injuries is blown off fingers, flash explosions in people’s faces,” she said. ”I get that their fun to play with and their good to look at but I just wish that they weren’t even available for people to have in their backyards.”

Since they are though, Fenner shares the few ways to stay safer and out of the hospital. For the kids, the doctor says do not let them handle any big fireworks and even though sparklers aren’t as dangerous, handle them with care with a bucket to douse them in nearby.

”We don’t see the catastrophic injuries with sparklers,” Fenner said.

For the adults, do not light a firework in your hand and try to throw it. If it is a dud, leave it. Never ever drink and shoot fireworks.

”Alcohol and fireworks. That’s just the type of people we see come in with those injuries because they’re just not being smart,” she said.

So even though Fenner says she cannot stop you, she hopes that you heed her advice to have a fun but safe time.

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