Fire Department Profile

North Chatham Volunteer Fire Department is a combination department staffed by 33 career and 26 volunteer firefighters. The department serves the northeastern portion of Chatham County and a small portion of southern Orange County, North Carolina.  We were founded in 1968 and currently operate out of 5 stations which cover about 255 square miles. Our Fire Chief is John Strowd and Deputy Chief is Mark Riggsbee. We respond to about 1500 incidents annually which include such things as: structural fires, woods fires, fire alarms, vehicle fires, automobile accidents, emergency medical calls, land search and recovery, swift water rescue and dive rescue and recovery.

North Chatham Volunteer Fire Department maintains an ISO class 6 rating district wide within 5 road miles of any of our stations.  Effective 10-01-2006 we also were granted a 9E rating for the area between 5 and 6 road miles from any of our stations. This entitles any structure within 6 road miles of any of our fire stations to a reduction in their fire insurance premiums.

North Chatham Volunteer Fire Department maintains the following qualifications through the North Carolina Rescue Association: Medium duty rescue, still water rescue, swift water rescue and dive rescue.

Our Mission

The mission of the North Chatham Volunteer Fire Department is to protect lives, property and the community environment from the destructive effects of fire, disaster or other life hazards by providing public education, incident prevention and emergency response services..