In 2025, fire departments serving Payson responded to 85 fire and hazmat incidents — from cooking fires to gas leaks to a single $300K building blaze. Here's the full picture.
Gas leak (natural gas or LPG) lead by count. Building fires lead by dollars. Together the top five categories make up about 79% of all calls.
Jul peaks. Apr dips. Watch for the typical fall climb starting in October.
500 incidents 2021–2025. Peak year was 2021. $300K cumulative property loss. 1 civilian deaths.
| Year | Incidents | YoY | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 143 | — | |
| 2022 | 127 | -11.2% | |
| 2023 | 105 | -17.3% | |
| 2024* | 40 | — | |
| 2025 | 85 | — |
* Well below Payson'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 Payson departments responded to in 2025, here's how they were classified once investigators were finished.
NFIRS Area of Origin (AREA_ORIG) for the 6 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 | 2 | 33.3% | |
| 2 | Open area - outside; included are farmland, field | 2 | 33.3% | |
| 3 | Operator/passenger area of transportation equip. | 1 | 16.7% | |
| 4 | Undetermined | 1 | 16.7% |
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 Payson mix.
| # | Heat source | Count | Share | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Undetermined | 3 | 50.0% | |
| 2 | Heat source: other | 1 | 16.7% | |
| 3 | Radiated, conducted heat from operating equipment | 1 | 16.7% | |
| 4 | Cigarette lighter | 1 | 16.7% |
Largest single-incident property losses reported by Payson departments in 2025. These 1 fires alone account for 100% of the city's annual total.
| # | Property loss | Type | Severity | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | $300,000 | Building fires | Major | Investigated |
Per-capita rates let us compare apples to apples. Payson sits below the national average for incidents per resident.
Top 25 wildfires (1992+) in the FPA-FOD ignitions database, scaled by acres. 783,479 acres burned in this 50-mile radius. Each dot is a fire — bigger dots burned more land.
| Year | Cause | Acres | Distance | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2018 | Natural | 102,191 | 16.4 mi | |
| 1996 | Natural | 89,148 | 34.6 mi | |
| 2018 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 68,547 | 48.9 mi | |
| 1999 | Railroad operations and maintenance | 58,707 | 38.6 mi | |
| 2012 | Natural | 48,986 | 47.6 mi | |
| 2012 | Power generation/transmission/distribution | 47,387 | 30.7 mi | |
| 1996 | Natural | 37,923 | 36.7 mi | |
| 2000 | Natural | 33,838 | 17.9 mi | |
| 2018 | Natural | 31,661 | 18.7 mi | |
| 1996 | Natural | 28,540 | 49.5 mi | |
| 1996 | Natural | 28,442 | 45.0 mi | |
| 2007 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 25,456 | 21.9 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 | 84651 | 500 |
Six Utah cities with population within ±25% of Payson. Useful comparison targets — same state, similar size, different fire profile.
1 departments report to NFIRS for incidents in Payson.
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.