In 2025, fire departments serving Oil City responded to 29 fire and hazmat incidents . Here's the full picture.
Building fires lead by count. Building fires lead by dollars. Together the top five categories make up about 59% of all calls.
Aug peaks. Jan dips. Watch for the typical fall climb starting in October.
55 incidents 2021–2025. Peak year was 2025.
| Year | Incidents | YoY | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 9 | — | |
| 2022 | 12 | +33.3% | |
| 2023* | 2 | — | |
| 2024* | 3 | — | |
| 2025 | 29 | — |
* Well below Oil City'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 Oil City departments responded to in 2025, here's how they were classified once investigators were finished.
NFIRS Area of Origin (AREA_ORIG) for the 13 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 | 9 | 69.2% | |
| 2 | Cooking area, kitchen | 1 | 7.7% | |
| 3 | Laundry area, wash house (laundry) | 1 | 7.7% | |
| 4 | Engine area, running gear, wheel area | 1 | 7.7% | |
| 5 | Outside area, other | 1 | 7.7% |
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 Oil City mix.
| # | Heat source | Count | Share | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Undetermined | 12 | 92.3% | |
| 2 | Arcing | 1 | 7.7% |
Per-capita rates let us compare apples to apples. Oil City sits above the national average for incidents per resident.
Top 25 wildfires (1992+) in the FPA-FOD ignitions database, scaled by acres. 60,279 acres burned in this 50-mile radius. Each dot is a fire — bigger dots burned more land.
| Year | Cause | Acres | Distance | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2011 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 41,050 | 30.7 mi | |
| 2011 | Arson/incendiarism | 2,378 | 9.0 mi | |
| 2011 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 2,324 | 48.9 mi | |
| 2011 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 2,036 | 16.4 mi | |
| 2011 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 1,465 | 21.8 mi | |
| 2004 | Arson/incendiarism | 1,299 | 35.4 mi | |
| 2011 | Arson/incendiarism | 1,048 | 15.6 mi | |
| 2011 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 902 | 12.3 mi | |
| 1996 | Debris and open burning | 850 | 31.9 mi | |
| 2007 | Arson/incendiarism | 740 | 49.6 mi | |
| 2004 | Natural | 727 | 43.6 mi | |
| 2015 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 669 | 48.7 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 | 71061 | 55 |
Six Louisiana cities with population within ±25% of Oil City. 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.