Fire Calls Drop 40% in 2011

Newport firefighters doused far fewer blazes in 2011 than a year earlier, officials said.

All told, the department responded to 199 fires last year, a drop of 41 percent from the 338 reported in 2010.

Fire Battalion Chief Chip Duncan attributed the decrease to two factors. "First, it shows that our community education and fire prevention efforts are paying off," Duncan told Patch. "Secondly, the decrease in fire responses is a national trend and not specific to Newport Beach."

Duncan said he couldn't say whether 2011's fire total was unusually low or 2010 was unusually high without doing a longer-term analysis.

But even as fires declined, overall emergencies climbed slightly. In 2011, the Newport Beach Fire Department responded to 9,811 emergency calls vs. 9,770 in 2010. Although firefighters saw a notable dip in calls for medical aid -- from 7,148 two years ago to 6,584 last year -- the number of hazardous material incidents jumped sharply, from 118 in 2010 to 170 incidents reported in 2011.

"I can’t confirm this, but I think that we are better at reporting hazmat incidents than in previous years," Duncan said.

Memorable 2011 Calls

Some calls are harder to classify.

"I’m not sure if we got a cat out of a tree last year, which we have done many times," Duncan said, but the department did respond to some odd emergencies:

• In June, firefighters rescued a 12-year-old Labrador retriever that mysteriously fell into an 18-foot hole in his backyard.

• In August, firefighters and lifeguards rescued 17-year-old Matt Mina, who was buried in the sand for about 30 minutes before being dug out. Mina had been digging two 5- to 7-foot-deep holes with a friend. When the two began tunneling toward each other, the tunnel collapsed.

• In October, firefighters rescued a man who was working on the back patio of a Newport Beach home and fell into a hole. The man summond help with his cell phone.

• Firefighters also rescued an owl that got stuck in the netting at a driving range.

Although the majority of emergency calls were routine, Duncan said the department strives to treat each call as equally important.

"We are in the business of providing a solution to the problem, whatever the problem may be," Duncan said. "If their house is on fire, we can handle that, and if their water heater is leaking and needs to be shut off, we can handle that too."