Alaska · NERIS

NERIS reporting in Alaska

Alaska's federal directory counts 147 fire departments, and just over half of the ones that report a type are volunteer: a narrower majority than plenty of states carry, spread across some of the longest distances between calls in the country.

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Fire departments in Alaska

Departments in the directory: 147
Volunteer departments: 50%
Volunteer or combination: 88%
Stations: 258

Across the 115 Alaska departments that report staffing, the directory holds 2,140 volunteer firefighters and 1,530 career firefighters; 58% of those counted are volunteers.

Source: the NERIS public department directory, as mirrored in our departments table on July 28, 2026. Percentages are stated against the number of departments that actually reported the field, which is always shown next to them. Departments that reported nothing are not counted as zero and no figure here is estimated.

Even split, not a landslide

Of the 115 Alaska departments that report a department type, 58 are volunteer, 43 are combination, and 14 are career. Put volunteer and combination together and 101 of the 115, or 88%, run on volunteers in some form. Volunteer departments alone make up just over half of the 115, a smaller majority than a near-unanimous volunteer state would show. That changes who is actually filing a NERIS report here: not one predictable kind of firefighter, but paid, part-paid, and volunteer staff all filing into the same modules, off the same incident-type hierarchy, regardless of which kind of roster signs their paycheck.

The headcount split runs differently than the department split. Across the 115 departments that report staffing, the directory counts 2,140 volunteer firefighters against 1,530 career. That’s 58% of the people counted, well short of the 88% of departments that lean volunteer at all. Paid firefighters look rarer at the department level than they turn out to be at the headcount level, which usually means the career staff are concentrated in a handful of larger departments while the rest of the state’s roster stays thin.

Distance instead of density

258 stations are reported across 119 of Alaska’s departments. A little over two apiece, not one firehouse per town. The fire service here doesn’t compress down into a single records office the way it can somewhere smaller and more connected: only 27 of Alaska’s 147 departments have a population-protected figure on file at all, too thin a slice of the roster to add into a statewide number worth repeating. Whatever gets filed lands on whoever ran the call, wherever that call happened to be, on the road system or off it, and NERIS doesn’t shrink the trip back before the report gets written.

Trying it doesn’t wait on NERIS

None of that has to get sorted out first. Recording an incident and reading back what came out of it doesn’t ask how your department is reached or how it’s staffed — it asks you to talk through the call and check what comes back. Getting FireMic authorized to actually submit into NERIS is a separate step for later, handled by whoever manages your department’s account there. Trying it isn’t.

Worth knowing about Alaska

Alaska's federal directory lists 147 fire departments — more than Wyoming's 104, but far fewer than most other states in this snapshot.
Source: snapshot: AK.department_count compared against department_count for every state/territory entry in state-department-snapshot.json
Of the 115 Alaska departments that report a department type, 58 are volunteer, 43 are combination, and 14 are career — 101 of them, 88%, run on volunteers in some form, but volunteer-only departments are just over half.
Source: snapshot: AK.by_department_type, AK.departments_with_type_data
Across the 115 Alaska departments that report firefighter staffing, the directory counts 2,140 volunteer firefighters against 1,530 career — a 58/42 split, a smaller volunteer share than the 88% of departments that lean volunteer at all.
Source: snapshot: AK.firefighters_volunteer_sum, AK.firefighters_career_sum, AK.departments_with_staffing_data
258 stations are reported across 119 of Alaska's 147 departments — a little over two stations for every department that answered.
Source: snapshot: AK.station_count_sum, AK.departments_with_station_data, AK.department_count
Only 27 of Alaska's 147 departments have a population-protected figure on file in the directory — too thin a sample of the roster to add into a statewide total worth stating.
Source: snapshot: AK.departments_with_population_data, AK.department_count

What changed

NERIS replaced NFIRS as the federal fire incident reporting standard onFebruary 1, 2026. It is a different shape of report, not a renamed one: modules instead of flat forms, a three-level text hierarchy instead of numeric incident codes, and an API instead of a file you upload.

What actually changed, in detail · NERIS onboarding (FSRI) · Department sign-up

About grant applications

Alaska departments that apply for an Assistance to Firefighters Grant are asked to describe their call volume and how the department runs. This page can't tell you whether NERIS reporting affects AFG eligibility or scoring — that isn't established anywhere we can point to, and a vendor guessing at federal grant rules isn't a source worth trusting. The plain, narrow fact underneath it: pulling those answers from reports already on file is quicker than piecing a season of runs back together from memory or a paper log.

We are a vendor, not a grant advisor. Do not take our word for what any grant program requires. Read the current notice of funding opportunity or ask your state's grant coordinator.

Try it on a real Alaska call

Record one incident, read the report it produces, and decide from there. No account, no card, no call with anyone.

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FireMic is a private company. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or recommended by any Alaska state agency, USFA, FSRI, or FEMA. State fire officials do not endorse vendors, and nothing on this page should be read as suggesting otherwise.

Department figures: FireMic Supabase departments table (mirror of the NERIS public department directory, ArcGIS layer 0). Snapshot taken July 28, 2026.