Fire Statistics

2005 NFPA Fire Statistics:

• 1,584,500 fires attended by public fire departments, decrease of 6.1% from 2002 (1,734,500) – ½ of 1976

• 519,500 structure fires, increase of 0.1% from 2002 (519,000)

• Of these structure fires, 401,000 or 77%, were residential fires

• 3,925 civilian deaths due to fire in 2003, increase of 16.1% from 2002 (3,380 deaths)

• 3,145 civilian deaths in residential fires (80% of total), increase of 17.8% from 2002 (civilian fire death every 134 minutes)

• 220 civilians died in nonresidential structure fires. This includes 100 civilians that died in the Station Nightclub Fire in Rhode Island, and 31 civilians who died in nursing home fires in Connecticut and Tennessee.

• A fire department responded to a fire somewhere in the U.S. every 20 sec. (3/min., 200/hr.)

• Property damage as a result of fire is estimated at $12,307,000,000 (California wildfires caused over $2B of the total) in 2003, increase of 19.1% from 2002 ($10,337,000,000 in 2002)

• An estimated 37,500 structure fires were deliberately set or suspected to have been

• Incendiary or suspicious fires resulted in 305 civilian deaths

Causes of Fires and Explosions

Acknowledgements – The above fire statistics were obtained from the report “Fire Loss in the United States During 2003″ dated October 2004 compiled by Michael J. Karter, Jr., Fire Analysis and Research Division of NFPA.