In 2011, public fire departments responded to 1,389,500 fires in
the United States, 4.4 percent more than the year before,
according to Michael Karter in his article “Fire Loss in the
United States During 2011” in the most recent issue of NFPA
Journal. These included an estimated 484,500 structure fires,
virtually the same number as occurred in 2010. Of these
structure fires, 386,000 were residential fires, accounting for
80 percent of all structure fires. For nonresidential structure
fires, some property types showed notable changes compared to
2010: there were 6,500 fires involving institutional properties,
an increase of 18.2 percent, and 10,000 fires involving
industrial properties, an increase of 11.1 percent. In addition,
686,000 outside fires were reported in 2011, an increase of 8.2
percent over 2010. An estimated 338,000 of these were brush,
grass, and wildland fires, a significant increase of 11.2
percent from the year before. You can read the article check out
the complete report online.