In 2025, fire departments serving Fitchburg responded to 664 fire and hazmat incidents — from cooking fires to gas leaks to a single $248K building blaze. Here's the full picture.
Cooking fire, confined to container lead by count. Building fires lead by dollars. Together the top five categories make up about 68% of all calls.
Oct peaks. Aug dips. Watch for the typical fall climb starting in October.
3,576 incidents 2021–2025. Peak year was 2022. $6.6M cumulative property loss. 1 civilian deaths.
| Year | Incidents | YoY | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 736 | — | |
| 2022 | 826 | +12.2% | |
| 2023 | 669 | -19.0% | |
| 2024 | 681 | +1.8% | |
| 2025 | 664 | -2.5% |
For the 52 building fires Fitchburg departments responded to in 2025, here's how they were classified once investigators were finished.
NFIRS Area of Origin (AREA_ORIG) for the 835 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 | Cooking area, kitchen | 172 | 20.6% | |
| 2 | Outside area, other | 147 | 17.6% | |
| 3 | Undetermined | 61 | 7.3% | |
| 4 | Highway, parking lot, street: on or near | 48 | 5.7% | |
| 5 | Open area - outside; included are farmland, field | 46 | 5.5% | |
| 6 | Engine area, running gear, wheel area | 45 | 5.4% | |
| 7 | Wildland, woods | 33 | 4.0% | |
| 8 | Exterior balcony, unenclosed porch | 28 | 3.4% | |
| 9 | Bedroom - < 5 persons; included are jail or prison | 27 | 3.2% | |
| 10 | Vehicle area, other | 25 | 3.0% | |
| 11 | All other areas | 203 | 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 Fitchburg mix.
| # | Heat source | Count | Share | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Undetermined | 237 | 28.4% | |
| 2 | Heat from powered equipment, other | 111 | 13.3% | |
| 3 | Cigarette | 103 | 12.3% | |
| 4 | Radiated, conducted heat from operating equipment | 100 | 12.0% | |
| 5 | Arcing | 65 | 7.8% | |
| 6 | Cigarette lighter | 54 | 6.5% | |
| 7 | Heat source: other | 41 | 4.9% | |
| 8 | Hot ember or ash | 26 | 3.1% | |
| 9 | Hot or smoldering object, other | 21 | 2.5% | |
| 10 | Heat from other open flame or smoking materials | 16 | 1.9% | |
| 11 | All other sources | 61 | 7.3% |
Largest single-incident property losses reported by Fitchburg departments in 2025. These 8 fires alone account for 74% of the city's annual total.
| # | Property loss | Type | Severity | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | $247,800 | Building fires | Significant | Investigated |
| 2 | $214,000 | Building fires | Significant | Investigated |
| 3 | $200,000 | Building fires | Significant | Investigated |
| 4 | $150,000 | Accident, potential accident, other | Significant | Investigated |
| 5 | $132,000 | Building fires | Significant | Investigated |
| 6 | $70,000 | Passenger vehicle fire | Significant | Investigated |
| 7 | $70,000 | Building fires | Significant | Investigated |
| 8 | $70,000 | Building fires | Significant | Investigated |
Per-capita rates let us compare apples to apples. Fitchburg sits above the national average for incidents per resident.
42 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 | 4 | |
| 10-19 | 0 | |
| 20-29 | 10 | |
| 30-39 | 12 | |
| 40-49 | 3 | |
| 50-59 | 8 | |
| 60-69 | 2 | |
| 70-79 | 3 | |
| 80+ | 0 |
Top 25 wildfires (1992+) in the FPA-FOD ignitions database, scaled by acres. 4,260 acres burned in this 50-mile radius. Each dot is a fire — bigger dots burned more land.
| Year | Cause | Acres | Distance | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2005 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 800 | 11.1 mi | |
| 2008 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 700 | 11.0 mi | |
| 2003 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 300 | 38.8 mi | |
| 2002 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 300 | 11.0 mi | |
| 2014 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 256 | 11.1 mi | |
| 2001 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 250 | 42.5 mi | |
| 2015 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 250 | 10.4 mi | |
| 2016 | Arson/incendiarism | 190 | 34.9 mi | |
| 2007 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 186 | 40.5 mi | |
| 2016 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 172 | 11.0 mi | |
| 2004 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 120 | 20.1 mi | |
| 2014 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 90 | 44.7 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 | 01420 | 3,576 |
Six Massachusetts cities with population within ±25% of Fitchburg. Useful comparison targets — same state, similar size, different fire profile.
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.