In 2025, fire departments serving Harrisonburg responded to 32 fire and hazmat incidents . Here's the full picture.
Incomplete 2025 data. Harrisonburg's departments reported 32 incidents to NFIRS for 2025, against about 479 in a typical year, so 2025 figures on this page undercount. The 2021–2025 totals are the better guide.
Fire, other lead by count. Building fires lead by dollars. Together the top five categories make up about 72% of all calls.
Oct peaks. Feb dips. Watch for the typical fall climb starting in October.
2,394 incidents 2021–2025. Peak year was 2022. $2.4M cumulative property loss.
| Year | Incidents | YoY | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 655 | — | |
| 2022 | 724 | +10.5% | |
| 2023 | 545 | -24.7% | |
| 2024 | 438 | -19.6% | |
| 2025* | 32 | — |
* Well below Harrisonburg'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 6 building fires Harrisonburg departments responded to in 2025, here's how they were classified once investigators were finished.
NFIRS Area of Origin (AREA_ORIG) for the 425 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 | 73 | 17.2% | |
| 2 | Highway, parking lot, street: on or near | 45 | 10.6% | |
| 3 | Engine area, running gear, wheel area | 37 | 8.7% | |
| 4 | Outside area, other | 34 | 8.0% | |
| 5 | Open area - outside; included are farmland, field | 34 | 8.0% | |
| 6 | Undetermined | 30 | 7.1% | |
| 7 | Courtyard, patio, porch, terrace | 21 | 4.9% | |
| 8 | Chute/container - trash, rubbish, waste | 17 | 4.0% | |
| 9 | Laundry area, wash house (laundry) | 12 | 2.8% | |
| 10 | Exterior, exposed surface | 12 | 2.8% | |
| 11 | All other areas | 110 | 25.9% |
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 Harrisonburg mix.
| # | Heat source | Count | Share | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Undetermined | 155 | 36.5% | |
| 2 | Radiated, conducted heat from operating equipment | 57 | 13.4% | |
| 3 | Arcing | 39 | 9.2% | |
| 4 | Cigarette | 29 | 6.8% | |
| 5 | Heat from powered equipment, other | 28 | 6.6% | |
| 6 | Hot or smoldering object, other | 20 | 4.7% | |
| 7 | Hot ember or ash | 18 | 4.2% | |
| 8 | Heat source: other | 16 | 3.8% | |
| 9 | Cigarette lighter | 11 | 2.6% | |
| 10 | Spark, ember or flame from operating equipment | 9 | 2.1% | |
| 11 | All other sources | 43 | 10.1% |
Per-capita rates let us compare apples to apples. Harrisonburg sits below the national average for incidents per resident.
15 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 | 0 | |
| 20-29 | 4 | |
| 30-39 | 4 | |
| 40-49 | 4 | |
| 50-59 | 1 | |
| 60-69 | 1 | |
| 70-79 | 0 | |
| 80+ | 0 |
Top 25 wildfires (1992+) in the FPA-FOD ignitions database, scaled by acres. 78,172 acres burned in this 50-mile radius. Each dot is a fire — bigger dots burned more land.
| Year | Cause | Acres | Distance | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2000 | Recreation and ceremony | 16,021 | 32.9 mi | |
| 2016 | Recreation and ceremony | 10,326 | 14.9 mi | |
| 2000 | Arson/incendiarism | 6,131 | 31.2 mi | |
| 2002 | Arson/incendiarism | 4,200 | 18.3 mi | |
| 2012 | Arson/incendiarism | 3,717 | 12.9 mi | |
| 2003 | Debris and open burning | 3,200 | 49.9 mi | |
| 2017 | Arson/incendiarism | 3,058 | 46.9 mi | |
| 2000 | Natural | 2,743 | 31.0 mi | |
| 2011 | Power generation/transmission/distribution | 2,564 | 9.9 mi | |
| 1999 | Debris and open burning | 2,206 | 18.5 mi | |
| 2012 | Natural | 2,138 | 33.0 mi | |
| 2018 | Equipment and vehicle use | 2,057 | 41.2 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 Virginia cities with population within ±25% of Harrisonburg. Useful comparison targets — same state, similar size, different fire profile.
4 departments report to NFIRS for incidents in Harrisonburg.
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.