In 2025, fire departments serving Detroit responded to 5,367 fire and hazmat incidents — from cooking fires to gas leaks to a single $2.0M building blaze. Here's the full picture.
Building fires lead by count. Building fires lead by dollars. Together the top five categories make up about 66% of all calls.
Jul peaks. Dec dips. Watch for the typical fall climb starting in October.
30,321 incidents 2021–2025. Peak year was 2022. $296.6M cumulative property loss. 73 civilian deaths.
| Year | Incidents | YoY | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2021* | 3,114 | — | |
| 2022 | 8,027 | — | |
| 2023 | 7,697 | -4.1% | |
| 2024 | 6,116 | -20.5% | |
| 2025 | 5,367 | -12.2% |
* Well below Detroit'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 1,197 building fires Detroit departments responded to in 2025, here's how they were classified once investigators were finished.
NFIRS Area of Origin (AREA_ORIG) for the 13,113 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 | 4,931 | 37.6% | |
| 2 | Engine area, running gear, wheel area | 954 | 7.3% | |
| 3 | Outside area, other | 914 | 7.0% | |
| 4 | Bedroom - < 5 persons; included are jail or prison | 577 | 4.4% | |
| 5 | Open area - outside; included are farmland, field | 577 | 4.4% | |
| 6 | Cooking area, kitchen | 548 | 4.2% | |
| 7 | Vacant structural area | 394 | 3.0% | |
| 8 | Wall surface: exterior | 384 | 2.9% | |
| 9 | Vehicle area, other | 326 | 2.5% | |
| 10 | Common room, den, family room, living room, lounge | 325 | 2.5% | |
| 11 | All other areas | 3,183 | 24.3% |
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 Detroit mix.
| # | Heat source | Count | Share | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Undetermined | 9,489 | 72.4% | |
| 2 | Hot ember or ash | 554 | 4.2% | |
| 3 | Hot or smoldering object, other | 490 | 3.7% | |
| 4 | Heat source: other | 429 | 3.3% | |
| 5 | Heat from direct flame, convection currents | 312 | 2.4% | |
| 6 | Heat from powered equipment, other | 287 | 2.2% | |
| 7 | Arcing | 273 | 2.1% | |
| 8 | Incendiary device | 191 | 1.5% | |
| 9 | Spark, ember or flame from operating equipment | 153 | 1.2% | |
| 10 | Radiated, conducted heat from operating equipment | 152 | 1.2% | |
| 11 | All other sources | 783 | 6.0% |
Largest single-incident property losses reported by Detroit departments in 2025. These 8 fires alone account for 14% of the city's annual total.
| # | Property loss | Type | Severity | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | $2,000,000 | Building fires | Major | Investigated |
| 2 | $1,000,000 | Building fires | Major | Investigated |
| 3 | $1,000,000 | Building fires | Major | Investigated |
| 4 | $1,000,000 | Building fires | Major | Investigated |
| 5 | $600,000 | Building fires | Major | Investigated |
| 6 | $500,000 | Building fires | Major | Investigated |
| 7 | $500,000 | Building fires | Major | Investigated |
| 8 | $400,000 | Building fires | Major | Investigated |
Per-capita rates let us compare apples to apples. Detroit sits above the national average for incidents per resident.
621 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 | 1 | |
| 10-19 | 4 | |
| 20-29 | 70 | |
| 30-39 | 76 | |
| 40-49 | 75 | |
| 50-59 | 64 | |
| 60-69 | 30 | |
| 70-79 | 11 | |
| 80+ | 25 |
Top 25 wildfires (1992+) in the FPA-FOD ignitions database, scaled by acres. 1,151 acres burned in this 50-mile radius. Each dot is a fire — bigger dots burned more land.
| Year | Cause | Acres | Distance | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | Debris and open burning | 300 | 26.6 mi | |
| 2018 | Equipment and vehicle use | 100 | 45.0 mi | |
| 2019 | Equipment and vehicle use | 80 | 36.3 mi | |
| 2005 | Debris and open burning | 77 | 34.1 mi | |
| 2010 | Arson/incendiarism | 69 | 48.2 mi | |
| 2003 | Debris and open burning | 53 | 44.0 mi | |
| 2020 | Debris and open burning | 50 | 33.7 mi | |
| 2019 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 49 | 17.9 mi | |
| 2010 | Arson/incendiarism | 42 | 24.0 mi | |
| 1994 | Recreation and ceremony | 38 | 32.6 mi | |
| 2003 | Equipment and vehicle use | 33 | 47.8 mi | |
| 1996 | Misuse of fire by a minor | 30 | 28.1 mi |
Top 10 ZIP codes by NFIRS incident count across 2021–2025. Each ZIP has its own fire profile — dive in for neighborhood-level context.
2 departments report to NFIRS for incidents in Detroit.
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.