In 2025, fire departments serving Lynn responded to 626 fire and hazmat incidents — from cooking fires to gas leaks to a single $2.5M 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 58% of all calls.
Aug peaks. Jun dips. Watch for the typical fall climb starting in October.
3,405 incidents 2021–2025. Peak year was 2021. $13.1M cumulative property loss. 3 civilian deaths.
| Year | Incidents | YoY | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 744 | — | |
| 2022 | 574 | -22.8% | |
| 2023 | 726 | +26.5% | |
| 2024 | 735 | +1.2% | |
| 2025 | 626 | -14.8% |
For the 66 building fires Lynn departments responded to in 2025, here's how they were classified once investigators were finished.
NFIRS Area of Origin (AREA_ORIG) for the 714 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 | Outside area, other | 170 | 23.8% | |
| 2 | Engine area, running gear, wheel area | 78 | 10.9% | |
| 3 | Cooking area, kitchen | 69 | 9.7% | |
| 4 | Undetermined | 39 | 5.5% | |
| 5 | Wildland, woods | 38 | 5.3% | |
| 6 | Bedroom - < 5 persons; included are jail or prison | 29 | 4.1% | |
| 7 | Highway, parking lot, street: on or near | 22 | 3.1% | |
| 8 | Exterior balcony, unenclosed porch | 20 | 2.8% | |
| 9 | Bathroom, checkroom, lavatory, locker room | 17 | 2.4% | |
| 10 | Open area - outside; included are farmland, field | 17 | 2.4% | |
| 11 | All other areas | 215 | 30.1% |
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 Lynn mix.
| # | Heat source | Count | Share | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Undetermined | 232 | 32.5% | |
| 2 | Arcing | 86 | 12.0% | |
| 3 | Cigarette | 84 | 11.8% | |
| 4 | Heat from powered equipment, other | 53 | 7.4% | |
| 5 | Hot or smoldering object, other | 47 | 6.6% | |
| 6 | Heat source: other | 30 | 4.2% | |
| 7 | Cigarette lighter | 24 | 3.4% | |
| 8 | Radiated, conducted heat from operating equipment | 23 | 3.2% | |
| 9 | Hot ember or ash | 23 | 3.2% | |
| 10 | Spark, ember or flame from operating equipment | 20 | 2.8% | |
| 11 | All other sources | 92 | 12.9% |
Largest single-incident property losses reported by Lynn departments in 2025. These 8 fires alone account for 79% of the city's annual total.
| # | Property loss | Type | Severity | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | $2,500,000 | Building fires | Major | Investigated |
| 2 | $1,300,000 | Building fires | Major | Investigated |
| 3 | $550,500 | Building fires | Major | Investigated |
| 4 | $514,000 | Building fires | Major | Investigated |
| 5 | $461,189 | Building fires | Major | Investigated |
| 6 | $300,000 | Building fires | Major | Investigated |
| 7 | $200,000 | Building fires | Significant | Investigated |
| 8 | $150,000 | Building fires | Significant | Investigated |
Per-capita rates let us compare apples to apples. Lynn sits below the national average for incidents per resident.
73 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 | 1 | |
| 20-29 | 2 | |
| 30-39 | 13 | |
| 40-49 | 27 | |
| 50-59 | 23 | |
| 60-69 | 1 | |
| 70-79 | 2 | |
| 80+ | 0 |
Top 25 wildfires (1992+) in the FPA-FOD ignitions database, scaled by acres. 3,654 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 | 34.3 mi | |
| 2008 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 700 | 34.4 mi | |
| 2003 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 300 | 17.4 mi | |
| 2002 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 300 | 34.4 mi | |
| 2014 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 256 | 34.4 mi | |
| 2015 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 250 | 34.9 mi | |
| 2007 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 186 | 10.2 mi | |
| 2016 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 172 | 34.3 mi | |
| 2014 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 90 | 1.9 mi | |
| 2020 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 79 | 34.5 mi | |
| 2018 | Debris and open burning | 58 | 35.2 mi | |
| 2016 | Debris and open burning | 55 | 41.4 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.
Six Massachusetts cities with population within ±25% of Lynn. 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.