this post was submitted on 23 Aug 2026
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It turns out it's a big fire in Boston...

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[–] Jason@feddit.uk 8 points 1 week ago (1 children)

So do people in the US rank the size of your fires in "alarms"??! Like a bin fire is a 1 alarm fire? But a house fire is a 3 alarm?

Do you say, "quick, evacuate the neighbourhood, there's an 8 alarm fire heading our way"

I've never heard of this before today.

[–] nilloc@discuss.tchncs.de 10 points 1 week ago (1 children)

The number of alarms is (I think) how many different departments, or possibly fire engines, are needed to fight the fire. So yes pretty much. It’s often how they are described in news articles.

[–] Telodzrum@lemmy.world 7 points 1 week ago (1 children)

It’s firefighter “units,” generally — kinda a mix of your two guesses.

[–] nilloc@discuss.tchncs.de 2 points 1 week ago

Hey thanks, I’m in the 10,000 today. Unit count does make sense. I wasn’t aware of the terminology for firefighting teams/groups/trucks.