Editorial policy

What we publish

FireVerge publishes two kinds of content:

• Data pages for states, counties, cities, ZIP codes, fire departments and wildfires. These are generated from public datasets. Nobody writes the numbers by hand, and every page says which dataset and which years it uses.
• News stories and guides written by the FireVerge editorial team. They cover US wildfires, smoke and air quality, structure fires, prevention, fire policy, and changes to our own data.

We don't publish sponsored stories, and no advertiser or data provider reviews or approves what we write.

Sources we rely on

Every factual claim has to trace back to a source a reader can check. In order of preference:

• Primary public data: the NFIRS Public Data Release (USFA/FEMA), NIFC and WFIGS wildfire data, InciWeb, the FEMA National Risk Index, the National Weather Service, EPA AirNow, and NASA FIRMS.
• Agency statements: press releases and incident updates from fire agencies such as CAL FIRE, the US Forest Service and state forestry departments, and from public-health and emergency-management offices.
• Established research and safety bodies: NFPA, USFA reports, peer-reviewed studies.
• Reputable news reporting: used for context and always credited with a link.

Each story lists its sources at the end. Where a figure is moving fast, such as acreage, containment or structures lost, we say the date it's accurate as of.

How we check a story

• We check numbers against the original source, not against another outlet's summary of it.
• We report names, quotes and casualty figures only when an official or on-the-record source has published them.
• When sources disagree, we say so and give both figures rather than picking one quietly.
• Where it helps, we link the story to the matching FireVerge data page, so a wildfire story in California points to California's fire data.

What we are not

FireVerge is not an emergency alert service. Our active-fire figures come from a dated snapshot, not a live feed. For evacuation orders and current fire status, follow your local fire agency, county emergency alerts and InciWeb. In an emergency, call 911.

Use of AI tools

We use software, including AI tools, to process datasets and help draft and edit copy. A person on the editorial team reviews every news story before it's published, and each factual claim has to match a cited source. The data pages are built by code from the datasets named on each page.

Corrections and updates

When we get something wrong, we fix it and say so. A story with a substantive change shows an "Updated" date, and the change is recorded on our corrections page. To report an error, email data@fireverge.com.

Independence

FireVerge is an independent project. We are not affiliated with FEMA, USFA, NIFC, NFPA, or any fire department or government agency. How we calculate our numbers is written up on the methodology page, and every dataset we use is listed under sources.