- Author
-
Federal Emergency Management Agency
- Title
- Profile of Fire in the United States, 1989-1998. 12th Edition.
- Coporate
- Federal Emergency Management Agency, Emmitsburg, MD
- Report
-
FA 214; 12th Edition,
August 2001,
17 p.
- Distribution
- AVAILABLE FROM: U.S. Fire Administration (USFA), 16825 South Seton Ave., Emmitsburg, MD 21727. Telephone: 301-447-1000. Website: http://www.usfa.fema.gov
- Keywords
-
fire statistics
|
fire losses
|
fire fighters
|
injuires
|
death
|
smoke detectors
|
sprinklers
|
urban fires
|
structures
|
automobile fires
- Identifiers
- ethnic, gender, and age characteristics; regional and state profiles; residential properties
- Abstract
- Over the past two decades, the fire problem in the United States has decreased. Fires, deaths, injuries, and economic losses all dropped. Although we are making progress against fire, the problem is still huge, and the United States still has one of the worst fire records, on a per capita basis, in the industrial world. Millions of fires, thousands of deaths, and tens of thousands of injuries occur each year. All natural disasters combined represent just a fraction of the losses from fire. The economic losses from fire are staggering-billions of dollars. In 1998 alone, fire departments responded to more than 4,800 fires each day. An average of 120 firefighters are injured daily responding to or fighting these fires, and more than 11 people die. Unless the fire is a spectacular blaze, the national media seldom reports these incidents. This report is intended to inform the populace, media, and public officials of the magnitude and seriousness of the U.S. fire problem.