What does '5 alarm fire' mean?

Question

and also 3 alarm, etc; i'm assuming it's the higher the more serious? like a richter scale for earthquakes; but how does it break down and how high does it go?

Answer 1

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the number of alarms is the number of different fire stations that have been called to battle the blaze.

so a 5 alarm fire is so big that fire trucks from 5 different fire stations have had to be called in to fight it.

so it sort of varies from place to place. a one alarm fire near a large fire station with plenty of trucks and men may be the same size as a three-alarm fire that is located by several smaller stations.

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4

Answer 2

Means the number of fire houses that the alarm is ringing at, a five alarm fire requires five firehouses vehicles and equipment to fight the fire.

Answer 3

5 alarms mean the number of engine companies responding to an incident. The greater the alarm, the greater the fire. At least I think that's the way I remember it. How high it goes depends on the incident itself. Sometimes fire departments will call in mutual aid from surrounding areas if they don't have enough manpower or equipment.

Answer 4

I've never heard of a five-alarm fire - that would be very serious. I think each alarm is used to call fire trucks to the scene. The first alarm brings one or two trucks, then if more help is needed, a second alarm calls more trucks, and so on.