Within the township, volunteers contribute more than 500 hours a year to presenting information for residents to become better informed. We, as volunteers, visit various locations: schools, churches, daycares, senior living facilities, summer camps, and local businesses. We also attend Open Houses during Fire Prevention Week annually. We proudly promote an open-door feeling policy! We are happy to speak with you about fire safety, give a station tour, or have a casual conversation.
Why do we do it?
- Every 24 seconds, a fire department in the United States responds to a fire somewhere in the nation. A fire occurs in a structure at the rate of one every 63 seconds, and a home fire occurs every 88 seconds.
- Seventy-seven percent of all fire deaths occurred in the home, a decrease of 4% compared to 2016.
- Home fires were responsible for 10,600 civilian injuries, 72% of all civilian injuries, in 2017.
- Public fire departments responded to 1,319,500 fires in 2017, a slight decrease of 2% from the previous year.
- An estimated $23 billion in property damage occurred due to fire in 2017, a large increase that includes a $10 billion loss in wildfires in Northern California.
- An estimated 22,500 structure fires were intentionally set in 2017, an increase of 13% from the previous year.
- Annual call statistics are increasing steadily across the country.
- The number of deaths at the scene of fires continued far lower than usual – 17 deaths, only two more than reported in 2016, with nine at structure fires and eight at wildland fires.
- Deaths among career and volunteer firefighters continued low in 2017, with both at the second-lowest level since 1977.
- Sudden cardiac death accounted for nearly half of the fatalities (29 deaths).
- An unusually high number of firefighters were struck and killed by vehicles in 2017 (10 deaths).