In 2025, fire departments serving Cranford responded to 303 fire and hazmat incidents — from cooking fires to gas leaks to a single $60K 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 68% of all calls.
Dec peaks. Nov dips. Watch for the typical fall climb starting in October.
824 incidents 2021–2025. Peak year was 2025. $1.6M cumulative property loss.
| Year | Incidents | YoY | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 105 | — | |
| 2022 | 129 | +22.9% | |
| 2023* | 30 | — | |
| 2024 | 257 | — | |
| 2025 | 303 | +17.9% |
* Well below Cranford'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 5 building fires Cranford departments responded to in 2025, here's how they were classified once investigators were finished.
NFIRS Area of Origin (AREA_ORIG) for the 97 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 | 17 | 17.5% | |
| 2 | Engine area, running gear, wheel area | 15 | 15.5% | |
| 3 | Cooking area, kitchen | 9 | 9.3% | |
| 4 | Outside area, other | 9 | 9.3% | |
| 5 | Open area - outside; included are farmland, field | 6 | 6.2% | |
| 6 | Exterior, exposed surface | 5 | 5.2% | |
| 7 | Highway, parking lot, street: on or near | 5 | 5.2% | |
| 8 | Courtyard, patio, porch, terrace | 4 | 4.1% | |
| 9 | Wildland, woods | 3 | 3.1% | |
| 10 | Bedroom - < 5 persons; included are jail or prison | 2 | 2.1% | |
| 11 | All other areas | 22 | 22.7% |
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 Cranford mix.
| # | Heat source | Count | Share | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Undetermined | 44 | 45.4% | |
| 2 | Radiated, conducted heat from operating equipment | 8 | 8.2% | |
| 3 | Cigarette | 8 | 8.2% | |
| 4 | Heat from direct flame, convection currents | 7 | 7.2% | |
| 5 | Arcing | 5 | 5.2% | |
| 6 | Spark, ember or flame from operating equipment | 4 | 4.1% | |
| 7 | Heat from powered equipment, other | 3 | 3.1% | |
| 8 | Heat from other open flame or smoking materials | 3 | 3.1% | |
| 9 | Radiated heat from another fire | 3 | 3.1% | |
| 10 | Heat, spark from friction | 2 | 2.1% | |
| 11 | All other sources | 10 | 10.3% |
Largest single-incident property losses reported by Cranford departments in 2025. These 8 fires alone account for 82% of the city's annual total.
| # | Property loss | Type | Severity | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | $60,000 | Building fires | Significant | Investigated |
| 2 | $40,000 | Hazardous condition, other | Significant | Investigated |
| 3 | $30,000 | Hazardous condition, other | Significant | Investigated |
| 4 | $23,000 | Building fires | Significant | Investigated |
| 5 | $20,000 | Passenger vehicle fire | Significant | Investigated |
| 6 | $15,000 | Passenger vehicle fire | Significant | Investigated |
| 7 | $8,000 | Off-road vehicle or heavy equipment fire | Significant | Investigated |
| 8 | $6,500 | Passenger vehicle fire | Significant | Investigated |
Per-capita rates let us compare apples to apples. Cranford sits above the national average for incidents per resident.
12 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 | 1 | |
| 30-39 | 8 | |
| 40-49 | 2 | |
| 50-59 | 1 | |
| 60-69 | 0 | |
| 70-79 | 0 | |
| 80+ | 0 |
Top 25 wildfires (1992+) in the FPA-FOD ignitions database, scaled by acres. 22,713 acres burned in this 50-mile radius. Each dot is a fire — bigger dots burned more land.
| Year | Cause | Acres | Distance | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2001 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 2,730 | 47.8 mi | |
| 2002 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 2,600 | 44.6 mi | |
| 2014 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 2,300 | 46.4 mi | |
| 2010 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 2,240 | 45.6 mi | |
| 2016 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 1,500 | 47.2 mi | |
| 2017 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 1,500 | 47.0 mi | |
| 1992 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 1,000 | 44.7 mi | |
| 1995 | Recreation and ceremony | 750 | 47.7 mi | |
| 1997 | Smoking | 702 | 47.4 mi | |
| 2016 | Recreation and ceremony | 641 | 37.2 mi | |
| 1999 | Arson/incendiarism | 623 | 48.7 mi | |
| 2016 | Recreation and ceremony | 552 | 40.4 mi |
Top 3 ZIP codes by NFIRS incident count across 2021–2025. Each ZIP has its own fire profile — dive in for neighborhood-level context.
Six New Jersey cities with population within ±25% of Cranford. Useful comparison targets — same state, similar size, different fire profile.
1 departments report to NFIRS for incidents in Cranford.
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.