In 2025, fire departments serving River Heights responded to 10 fire and hazmat incidents — from cooking fires to gas leaks to a single $3K 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 80% of all calls.
Apr peaks. Jan dips. Watch for the typical fall climb starting in October.
19 incidents 2021–2025. Peak year was 2025. $3K cumulative property loss.
| Year | Incidents | YoY | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 3 | — | |
| 2022* | 1 | — | |
| 2023* | 2 | — | |
| 2024 | 3 | — | |
| 2025 | 10 | +233.3% |
* Well below River Heights'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 1 building fires River Heights departments responded to in 2025, here's how they were classified once investigators were finished.
NFIRS Area of Origin (AREA_ORIG) for the 1 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 | 1 | 100.0% |
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 River Heights mix.
| # | Heat source | Count | Share | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Heat from powered equipment, other | 1 | 100.0% |
Largest single-incident property losses reported by River Heights departments in 2025. These 1 fires alone account for 100% of the city's annual total.
| # | Property loss | Type | Severity | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | $3,000 | Building fires | Significant | Investigated |
Per-capita rates let us compare apples to apples. River Heights sits below the national average for incidents per resident.
Top 25 wildfires (1992+) in the FPA-FOD ignitions database, scaled by acres. 251,988 acres burned in this 50-mile radius. Each dot is a fire — bigger dots burned more land.
| Year | Cause | Acres | Distance | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2001 | Natural | 40,000 | 37.4 mi | |
| 1994 | Natural | 31,395 | 38.7 mi | |
| 2016 | Natural | 20,616 | 28.4 mi | |
| 2018 | Natural | 15,046 | 30.9 mi | |
| 2007 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 13,784 | 37.0 mi | |
| 2018 | Power generation/transmission/distribution | 13,763 | 39.0 mi | |
| 2000 | Natural | 12,498 | 46.9 mi | |
| 2003 | Natural | 11,200 | 38.7 mi | |
| 1994 | Natural | 10,500 | 25.0 mi | |
| 2013 | Natural | 9,674 | 33.3 mi | |
| 1998 | Equipment and vehicle use | 8,594 | 45.5 mi | |
| 1994 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 7,680 | 36.6 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 | 84321 | 19 |
Six Utah cities with population within ±25% of River Heights. 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.