In 2025, fire departments serving Pine Beach responded to 14 fire and hazmat incidents . Here's the full picture.
Electrical wiring/equipment problem, other lead by count. Building fires lead by dollars. Together the top five categories make up about 86% of all calls.
Oct peaks. Aug dips. Watch for the typical fall climb starting in October.
87 incidents 2021–2025. Peak year was 2023. $8K cumulative property loss.
| Year | Incidents | YoY | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 18 | — | |
| 2022* | 10 | — | |
| 2023 | 25 | — | |
| 2024 | 20 | -20.0% | |
| 2025 | 14 | -30.0% |
* Well below Pine Beach'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 0 building fires Pine Beach departments responded to in 2025, here's how they were classified once investigators were finished.
NFIRS Area of Origin (AREA_ORIG) for the 7 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 | 2 | 28.6% | |
| 2 | Cooking area, kitchen | 1 | 14.3% | |
| 3 | Laundry area, wash house (laundry) | 1 | 14.3% | |
| 4 | Attic: vacant, crawl space above top story, cupola | 1 | 14.3% | |
| 5 | Engine area, running gear, wheel area | 1 | 14.3% | |
| 6 | Exterior, exposed surface | 1 | 14.3% |
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 Pine Beach mix.
| # | Heat source | Count | Share | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Undetermined | 5 | 71.4% | |
| 2 | Hot or smoldering object, other | 1 | 14.3% | |
| 3 | Flame/torch used for lighting | 1 | 14.3% |
Per-capita rates let us compare apples to apples. Pine Beach sits below the national average for incidents per resident.
Top 25 wildfires (1992+) in the FPA-FOD ignitions database, scaled by acres. 108,514 acres burned in this 50-mile radius. Each dot is a fire — bigger dots burned more land.
| Year | Cause | Acres | Distance | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1995 | Arson/incendiarism | 19,225 | 7.5 mi | |
| 2007 | Arson/incendiarism | 17,050 | 17.4 mi | |
| 1999 | Equipment and vehicle use | 11,765 | 21.3 mi | |
| 2019 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 11,638 | 18.8 mi | |
| 1992 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 5,284 | 9.5 mi | |
| 1992 | Arson/incendiarism | 4,832 | 8.6 mi | |
| 2017 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 3,577 | 30.6 mi | |
| 2017 | Natural | 3,477 | 37.8 mi | |
| 1992 | Arson/incendiarism | 2,900 | 21.8 mi | |
| 2001 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 2,730 | 7.8 mi | |
| 2002 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 2,600 | 18.5 mi | |
| 2007 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 2,450 | 32.0 mi |
Top 2 ZIP codes by NFIRS incident count across 2021–2025. Each ZIP has its own fire profile — dive in for neighborhood-level context.
Six New Jersey cities with population within ±25% of Pine Beach. Useful comparison targets — same state, similar size, different fire profile.
1 departments report to NFIRS for incidents in Pine Beach.
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.