In 2025, fire departments serving Bedford responded to 312 fire and hazmat incidents — from cooking fires to gas leaks to a single $350K building blaze. Here's the full picture.
Brush, or brush and grass mixture fire lead by count. Building fires lead by dollars. Together the top five categories make up about 57% of all calls.
Jan peaks. Oct dips. Watch for the typical fall climb starting in October.
1,077 incidents 2021–2025. Peak year was 2025. $4.3M cumulative property loss. 1 civilian deaths.
| Year | Incidents | YoY | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2021* | 123 | — | |
| 2022 | 196 | — | |
| 2023 | 249 | +27.0% | |
| 2024 | 197 | -20.9% | |
| 2025 | 312 | +58.4% |
* Well below Bedford's usual volume. That almost always means one or more departments didn't submit a full year to NFIRS, not that fires dropped, so no year-over-year change is shown for it.
For the 40 building fires Bedford departments responded to in 2025, here's how they were classified once investigators were finished.
NFIRS Area of Origin (AREA_ORIG) for the 172 building fires investigators classified across 2021–2025. The room or location where ignition occurred — kitchens, bedrooms, exterior, vehicle areas — tells you where to focus prevention.
| # | Area of origin | Count | Share | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Undetermined | 44 | 25.6% | |
| 2 | Engine area, running gear, wheel area | 41 | 23.8% | |
| 3 | Vehicle area, other | 12 | 7.0% | |
| 4 | Common room, den, family room, living room, lounge | 7 | 4.1% | |
| 5 | Cooking area, kitchen | 7 | 4.1% | |
| 6 | Open area - outside; included are farmland, field | 7 | 4.1% | |
| 7 | Laundry area, wash house (laundry) | 5 | 2.9% | |
| 8 | Outside area, other | 5 | 2.9% | |
| 9 | Bathroom, checkroom, lavatory, locker room | 4 | 2.3% | |
| 10 | Vehicle storage area; garage, carport | 4 | 2.3% | |
| 11 | All other areas | 36 | 20.9% |
NFIRS Heat Source (HEAT_SOURC) — the physical thing that started it. Spark or ember from operating equipment, an open flame, smoking materials, or hot embers from a fireplace are the leading culprits nationwide. Here's the Bedford mix.
| # | Heat source | Count | Share | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Undetermined | 95 | 55.2% | |
| 2 | Heat from powered equipment, other | 13 | 7.6% | |
| 3 | Radiated, conducted heat from operating equipment | 9 | 5.2% | |
| 4 | Heat source: other | 8 | 4.7% | |
| 5 | Arcing | 8 | 4.7% | |
| 6 | Spark, ember or flame from operating equipment | 7 | 4.1% | |
| 7 | Hot or smoldering object, other | 5 | 2.9% | |
| 8 | Heat, spark from friction | 5 | 2.9% | |
| 9 | Cigarette | 5 | 2.9% | |
| 10 | Heat from other open flame or smoking materials | 4 | 2.3% | |
| 11 | All other sources | 13 | 7.6% |
Largest single-incident property losses reported by Bedford departments in 2025. These 8 fires alone account for 91% of the city's annual total.
| # | Property loss | Type | Severity | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | $350,000 | Building fires | Major | Investigated |
| 2 | $350,000 | Passenger vehicle fire | Major | Investigated |
| 3 | $350,000 | Passenger vehicle fire | Major | Investigated |
| 4 | $175,000 | Off-road vehicle or heavy equipment fire | Significant | Investigated |
| 5 | $124,500 | Building fires | Significant | Investigated |
| 6 | $124,500 | Mobile property (vehicle) fire, other | Significant | Investigated |
| 7 | $124,500 | Mobile property (vehicle) fire, other | Significant | Investigated |
| 8 | $56,700 | Building fires | Significant | Investigated |
Per-capita rates let us compare apples to apples. Bedford sits above the national average for incidents per resident.
8 fire-related casualties recorded in NFIRS Module 11 across the 2021–2025 window. Age, gender, and severity are coarse-binned — no individual identification possible.
| Age | Count | |
|---|---|---|
| 0-9 | 0 | |
| 10-19 | 0 | |
| 20-29 | 2 | |
| 30-39 | 1 | |
| 40-49 | 1 | |
| 50-59 | 2 | |
| 60-69 | 2 | |
| 70-79 | 0 | |
| 80+ | 0 |
Top 25 wildfires (1992+) in the FPA-FOD ignitions database, scaled by acres. 85,813 acres burned in this 50-mile radius. Each dot is a fire — bigger dots burned more land.
| Year | Cause | Acres | Distance | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2012 | Arson/incendiarism | 15,454 | 37.3 mi | |
| 2012 | Railroad operations and maintenance | 11,381 | 47.4 mi | |
| 2016 | Debris and open burning | 11,229 | 32.8 mi | |
| 2012 | Fireworks | 7,351 | 36.1 mi | |
| 2008 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 3,990 | 25.2 mi | |
| 2003 | Debris and open burning | 3,200 | 41.7 mi | |
| 2017 | Arson/incendiarism | 3,058 | 41.5 mi | |
| 2002 | Natural | 2,935 | 17.2 mi | |
| 2006 | Arson/incendiarism | 2,871 | 21.0 mi | |
| 2008 | Power generation/transmission/distribution | 2,738 | 33.6 mi | |
| 1995 | Smoking | 2,151 | 36.0 mi | |
| 2018 | Equipment and vehicle use | 2,057 | 42.6 mi |
Top 7 ZIP codes by NFIRS incident count across 2021–2025. Each ZIP has its own fire profile — dive in for neighborhood-level context.
Six Virginia cities with population within ±25% of Bedford. Useful comparison targets — same state, similar size, different fire profile.
1 departments report to NFIRS for incidents in Bedford.
A 30-minute weekend can cut your home's exposure substantially. These four checklists are a good starting point.
Numbers reflect incidents reported by participating fire departments to the National Fire Incident Reporting System (NFIRS) Public Data Release for calendar year 2025. NFIRS is voluntary — about 23,000 of roughly 30,000 US fire departments report — so totals are a strong indicator, not a complete census. Per-capita comparisons use 2023 ACS population estimates. Wildland fire data complements NFIRS with NIFC and USFS perimeters. Active-fire counts come from a dated NIFC snapshot, not a live feed.