FOI Request 2251

Subject: Construction Site Fires

Status: Complete

Date received: November 2025

Question Asked:

I am writing to request information under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 regarding fires attended at construction sites.

Please provide the following information for the past three calendar years (2022, 2023, and 2024):

1. The total number of fires attended at premises classified as “Construction site”, “Building under construction” or any other equivalent property type recorded under the Incident Recording System (IRS).

2. For each recorded incident, where available:

   a) The date or month and year of the incident

   b) The recorded cause of fire as entered in the IRS (e.g. deliberate, electrical fault, misuse of equipment, etc.)

   c) The extent of damage (for example, confined to room of origin, spread to whole building, or other IRS category)

   d) Any recorded cost of response or property damage, if held

Our Response:

Please find below the data requested regarding fires in buildings under construction attended by Cheshire Fire and Rescue Service in 2022, 2023 and 2024. The information has been taken from the Cheshire Fire and Rescue Service Incident Recording System (IRS).

The following caveats apply to the data provided:

• There is no specific property types on the IRS for ‘construction site’ so the question ‘Is the building normally occupied?’ has been used to provide this data. If this question has been answered as ‘No - under construction’ the incident has been included in the dataset.

• The question ‘Is the building normally occupied?’ is only required to be answered when the incident is a primary fire or a chimney fire in a building which is not derelict.

• Due to the unique circumstances of each incident, we cannot provide costs incurred by Cheshire Fire and Rescue Service.

Outcome: Information Provided

FOI responded to within timescales: YES

Further action: NO