In 2025, fire departments serving Bethel responded to 46 fire and hazmat incidents — from cooking fires to gas leaks to a single $5K building blaze. Here's the full picture.
Power line down lead by count. Building fires lead by dollars. Together the top five categories make up about 63% of all calls.
Mar peaks. Apr dips. Watch for the typical fall climb starting in October.
54 incidents 2021–2025. Peak year was 2025. $5K cumulative property loss.
| Year | Incidents | YoY | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2021* | 2 | — | |
| 2022* | 0 | — | |
| 2023* | 1 | — | |
| 2024* | 5 | — | |
| 2025 | 46 | — |
* Well below Bethel'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 1 building fires Bethel departments responded to in 2025, here's how they were classified once investigators were finished.
NFIRS Area of Origin (AREA_ORIG) for the 2 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 | Equipment or service area, other | 1 | 50.0% | |
| 2 | Heating room or area, water heater area | 1 | 50.0% |
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 Bethel mix.
| # | Heat source | Count | Share | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Hot ember or ash | 2 | 100.0% |
Largest single-incident property losses reported by Bethel departments in 2025. These 1 fires alone account for 100% of the city's annual total.
| # | Property loss | Type | Severity | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | $5,000 | Building fires | Significant | Investigated |
Per-capita rates let us compare apples to apples. Bethel sits above the national average for incidents per resident.
Top 25 wildfires (1992+) in the FPA-FOD ignitions database, scaled by acres. 1,259 acres burned in this 50-mile radius. Each dot is a fire — bigger dots burned more land.
| Year | Cause | Acres | Distance | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2016 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 329 | 37.3 mi | |
| 2004 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 139 | 32.5 mi | |
| 2006 | Railroad operations and maintenance | 100 | 32.2 mi | |
| 1992 | Arson/incendiarism | 64 | 7.5 mi | |
| 1995 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 60 | 23.4 mi | |
| 2000 | Debris and open burning | 51 | 8.0 mi | |
| 2016 | Natural | 43 | 43.0 mi | |
| 2006 | Debris and open burning | 40 | 4.6 mi | |
| 2003 | Debris and open burning | 40 | 28.5 mi | |
| 2006 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 39 | 30.7 mi | |
| 2011 | Arson/incendiarism | 33 | 23.7 mi | |
| 2013 | Arson/incendiarism | 32 | 36.3 mi |
Top 1 ZIP codes by NFIRS incident count across 2021–2025. Each ZIP has its own fire profile — dive in for neighborhood-level context.
| # | ZIP | 5-yr incidents | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 04217 | 54 |
Six Maine cities with population within ±25% of Bethel. Useful comparison targets — same state, similar size, different fire profile.
1 departments report to NFIRS for incidents in Bethel.
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.