Massachusetts County Rankings

Fire deaths 2017-2018

Massachusetts's 14 counties are ranked by the Overall Fireground Index — a normalization of the civilian fire-death rate (Massachusetts Department of Fire Services counts per Census population), the one metric comparable across every county. Data confidence flags counties where small counts or sparse public reporting make the profile less certain; it is never folded into the score.

Massachusetts counties ranked by Overall Fireground Index, with fire-death rate, five-year deaths, and data confidence.
Rank	County	Index	Fire-death rate	Deaths (5yr)	Confidence
1	Dukes County21,061 pop.	73	0.00	0	limited
2	Essex County823,938 pop.	65	0.29	12	moderate
3	Suffolk County793,144 pop.	63	0.40	16	moderate
4	Norfolk County740,754 pop.	62	0.43	16	moderate
5	Plymouth County542,090 pop.	60	0.52	14	moderate
6	Middlesex County1,668,956 pop.	59	0.55	46	moderate
7	Hampshire County165,399 pop.	58	0.60	5	moderate
8	Barnstable County232,570 pop.	54	0.77	9	moderate
9	Worcester County881,248 pop.	54	0.75	33	moderate
10	Bristol County588,593 pop.	50	0.92	27	moderate
11	Hampden County464,151 pop.	40	1.34	31	moderate
12	Nantucket County14,670 pop.	39	1.36	1	moderate
13	Berkshire County128,726 pop.	12	2.49	16	moderate
14	Franklin County70,871 pop.	11	2.54	9	moderate

Counties are ranked only against one another. A low fire-death count in a small county produces a high score but a limited confidence flag — the uncertainty is shown, not hidden. See the methodology and data sources.