There’s roughly 100 firefighter arsonists convicted every year in North America and all of them are serial arsonists, which means three or more fires,” Nordskog told CBC.
According to Nordskog, firefighter arsonists tend to be young males who recently joined the fire service, who may become bored, desire recognition and struggle with anger or frustration.
All things considered, it’s probably a smaller percentage vs. doctors doing un-doctor things, cops, etc.
> it’s probably a smaller percentage vs. doctors doing un-doctor things
There's roughly 200 doctors convicted every year in the U.S. alone of criminal 'patient abuse or neglect', for data compiled between 1988 and 2026 [1]. While I'd prefer to cite the 'patient abuse' figure since 'patient harmer' is the most equivalent behavior to 'firefighter arsonist' (both cause the problem they treat), I think it's worth remembering that human beings — regardless of their profession — have a slim but non-zero chance of deciding to create problems that give them professional satisfaction to solve.
I don't think you can extrapolate it to every profession lol. Even in your example, doctors and cops face much more scrutiny and doing an "undoctor" thing can mean your career is gone. It is far easier for them to comit arson tbh than do the equivalent opposite of their profession's general aims
Despite which there's a steady trickle of paediatricians (doctors specialising in child care) being rumbled for various forms of child related sexual activity.
Why will developers insert bugs and make their own work harder? there is no extra recognition there, which is primarily a reason why they are doing it. But if you are regularly shipping bugs because you feel good at then fixing it and expect people to appreciate you for it, how long do you think that dev will last at a role?
Don’t think logically, think like a narcissist: If you plant that bug, you exactly know
how to fix it. The more damage it causes, the higher the admiration if you fix it. HOWEVER, for that to work you'd need to blame someone else and gaslight everyone into believing your story. That makes it a tad more difficult, but I think it’s still doable.
Australia gets very dry and pretty severe bush fires. We have the same unfortunate phenomena, 2019, 2023 https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-08-31/hunter-valley-rfs-fir...
There is a hero complex associated with this type of occupation, coupled with boredom perhaps. This is however not recurring theme, an anomaly in the statistics. Year on year we do have many brave, volunteer and professional firefighters rescue many properties and lives.
More sobering thought: conviction rates are typically a small percentage of the people who do the foul deed. The definition of "arsonist", for example. What if someone started "just one" fire?
A more sobering thought: of the total fires fought each year, how many are started by those rogue firefighters?
A most sobering thought: why is it that there is so much fallow time, that they get bored?
This is a completely useless article. Is 100 a lot? The article never even hints at what percentage of firefighters that is, let alone total arsonists. Should we be outraged? Are firefighters more likely to be arsonists?
It says "in North America", so I assume that's across US and Canada. There are 1.2 million firefighters in the US, and about 150k in Canada, so let's call it 1.3 million. 100 out of 1.3 million is statistically irrelevant.
How's that stack up against the general public? That'd be good to know, but the article doesn't touch on it. The latest data i can find is for the US in 2024, where there were 65,795 arson convictions. There are 349 million people in the US, so the number of arsonists is 0.0001% of the general population. The number of firefighters that are arsonists (100/65,795) is 0.0015%, so I suppose it's slightly higher that the general population.
> There are 349 million people in the US, so the number of arsonists is 0.0001% of the general population. The number of firefighters that are arsonists (100/65,795) is 0.0015%, so I suppose it's slightly higher that the general population.
You comparing arsonists/pop with firefighter-arsonists/arsonists. That’s the wrong comparison. You should be comparing arsonists/pop with firefighter-arsonists/firefighters. Or firefighters/pop with firefighter-arsonists/arsonists.
(On top of that, mixing numbers from different sources can be problematic. For example, how are repeat convictions treated in the different sources? Who counts as a firefighter?)
Both the OPs post and the CBC article say records aren't detailed for this so unless theres some studies (lol funding in current political era) you prob will never have real percents.
But i think its fair to say yea firefighters are more likely to be arsonists i guess.
> the number of arsonists is 0.0001% of the general population. The number of firefighters that are arsonists (100/65,795) is 0.0015%, so I suppose it's slightly higher that the general population.
Trying to imagine being really into math and seeing one number that’s fifteen times bigger than another number and posting “that’s slightly higher”
Most guys that go into firefighting really enjoy looking at fire, I can say that much. And this problem exists globally.
Maybe we can also ask why women don't join to fight fires and there's 10% or less participation. Compared to police forces globally there's under 10% female firefighters but around 30% female police officers, so it's not as simple as "it's dangerous and women are afraid".
> “There’s roughly 100 firefighter arsonists convicted every year in North America and all of them are serial arsonists, which means three or more fires,”
OK, so why should I care? A brief Google shows the population of North America at ~600 million people. And the number of firefighters in North America at ~1.3 million. So your likelihood of being victimized by a serial firefighter arsonist is about the same as being struck by lightning, dying in a plane crash, or being killed by a falling coconut.
Excellent point. We absolutely should not care that the people we hire to protect are are sometimes convicted of harming us. It's only a few hundred victims a year so we should utterly ignore that it's happening. That traditionally solves all issues.
Key information:
There’s roughly 100 firefighter arsonists convicted every year in North America and all of them are serial arsonists, which means three or more fires,” Nordskog told CBC.
According to Nordskog, firefighter arsonists tend to be young males who recently joined the fire service, who may become bored, desire recognition and struggle with anger or frustration.
All things considered, it’s probably a smaller percentage vs. doctors doing un-doctor things, cops, etc.
> it’s probably a smaller percentage vs. doctors doing un-doctor things
There's roughly 200 doctors convicted every year in the U.S. alone of criminal 'patient abuse or neglect', for data compiled between 1988 and 2026 [1]. While I'd prefer to cite the 'patient abuse' figure since 'patient harmer' is the most equivalent behavior to 'firefighter arsonist' (both cause the problem they treat), I think it's worth remembering that human beings — regardless of their profession — have a slim but non-zero chance of deciding to create problems that give them professional satisfaction to solve.
[1] https://plaindiscipline.com/action-type/conviction-patient-a... —
> have a slim but non-zero chance of deciding to create problems that give them professional satisfaction to solve.
Ahh right, my homelab.
This may also be subject to survivorship bias, and there may be a portion of firefighter arsonists who escape prosecution or conviction
How is that any different than any other profession?
> all of them are serial arsonists, which means three or more fires
So, the number '100', has to wildly low, as some arsonists will not have been caught, or only started one or two fires.
I don't think you can extrapolate it to every profession lol. Even in your example, doctors and cops face much more scrutiny and doing an "undoctor" thing can mean your career is gone. It is far easier for them to comit arson tbh than do the equivalent opposite of their profession's general aims
Despite which there's a steady trickle of paediatricians (doctors specialising in child care) being rumbled for various forms of child related sexual activity.
eg: earlier this month https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-07-03/perth-paediatrician-c...
Pedo is not the opposite of doctor though, is it?
Arsonists drawn to firefighting field. People with mental health issues becoming therapists. People with eating disorders becoming dietitians.
I'm trying to figure out what pathology I'm hiding as a software engineer.
[delayed]
You're secretly a robot.
Secretly?
I’m curious what other professions have analogous issues.
Police who seed crime? (Surely.)
Developers who insert bugs?
20y ago in Poland there was a huge story where the ER responders were killing people to sell hints to a funeral house. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skin_Hunters
Maybe politicians. They try to stage violent attacks against themselves and then accuse other parties for their own political gain.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_flag
Cybersecurity researchers who let loose worms or ransomware?
Car mechanics who break things so you come back for more business?
Airline pilots who... hijack their own flight?... Hm
Tire dealers that go around puncturing tires has been a urban legend for decades
That would be an expensive way to drum up business.
Expensive to just buy a box of suitable nails and just sprinkle them around while they're already driving places?
... And then drive under the threat that their own tires will get punctured as well.
> Developers who insert bugs
I knew it was the developers!
There is nearly a 100% conviction rate of the closest family member if the spouse/child/parent dies soon after a life insurance policy is created
My theory is that there is at least one serial killer that is a life insurance agent or someone that can see all the new policies
Garbageman comes to mind
Why will developers insert bugs and make their own work harder? there is no extra recognition there, which is primarily a reason why they are doing it. But if you are regularly shipping bugs because you feel good at then fixing it and expect people to appreciate you for it, how long do you think that dev will last at a role?
Don’t think logically, think like a narcissist: If you plant that bug, you exactly know how to fix it. The more damage it causes, the higher the admiration if you fix it. HOWEVER, for that to work you'd need to blame someone else and gaslight everyone into believing your story. That makes it a tad more difficult, but I think it’s still doable.
Australia gets very dry and pretty severe bush fires. We have the same unfortunate phenomena, 2019, 2023 https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-08-31/hunter-valley-rfs-fir... There is a hero complex associated with this type of occupation, coupled with boredom perhaps. This is however not recurring theme, an anomaly in the statistics. Year on year we do have many brave, volunteer and professional firefighters rescue many properties and lives.
> Australia gets very dry and pretty severe bush fires. We have the same unfortunate phenomena, 2019
2019 was an American right wing/Facebook/Twitter job to downplay climate change and instead push the narrative that it was all done by arsonists
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-01-08/fires-misinformation-...
He said the topic appeared to be attracting a "suspiciously high number of bot-like and troll-like accounts".
---
Sad to see that American narrative about Australia still being spread
I looked it up: About a million firefighters in the US, including volunteer firefighters.
Having 1 in 10,000 of them convicted of arson each year is a wild statistic.
Your stats sent me into sobering-thoughts-mode...
More sobering thought: conviction rates are typically a small percentage of the people who do the foul deed. The definition of "arsonist", for example. What if someone started "just one" fire?
A more sobering thought: of the total fires fought each year, how many are started by those rogue firefighters?
A most sobering thought: why is it that there is so much fallow time, that they get bored?
This is the fact that’s literally a .0001% chance
.01%
This is a completely useless article. Is 100 a lot? The article never even hints at what percentage of firefighters that is, let alone total arsonists. Should we be outraged? Are firefighters more likely to be arsonists?
It says "in North America", so I assume that's across US and Canada. There are 1.2 million firefighters in the US, and about 150k in Canada, so let's call it 1.3 million. 100 out of 1.3 million is statistically irrelevant.
How's that stack up against the general public? That'd be good to know, but the article doesn't touch on it. The latest data i can find is for the US in 2024, where there were 65,795 arson convictions. There are 349 million people in the US, so the number of arsonists is 0.0001% of the general population. The number of firefighters that are arsonists (100/65,795) is 0.0015%, so I suppose it's slightly higher that the general population.
All this should have been in the article.
> There are 349 million people in the US, so the number of arsonists is 0.0001% of the general population. The number of firefighters that are arsonists (100/65,795) is 0.0015%, so I suppose it's slightly higher that the general population.
You comparing arsonists/pop with firefighter-arsonists/arsonists. That’s the wrong comparison. You should be comparing arsonists/pop with firefighter-arsonists/firefighters. Or firefighters/pop with firefighter-arsonists/arsonists.
(On top of that, mixing numbers from different sources can be problematic. For example, how are repeat convictions treated in the different sources? Who counts as a firefighter?)
This 'article' (its a blog post if anything) is based on this this CBC article.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/fires-set-by-firefig...
The article refers to a report that 404s.
Both the OPs post and the CBC article say records aren't detailed for this so unless theres some studies (lol funding in current political era) you prob will never have real percents.
But i think its fair to say yea firefighters are more likely to be arsonists i guess.
Matt Hinds-Aldrich NVFC papers:
Firesetting Firefighters: Reconsidering a Persistent Problem--Firefighter Arson Research
~ https://www.academia.edu/1052901/Firesetting_Firefighters_Re...
National Volunteer Fire Council - Report on the Firefighter Arson Problem: Contexts, Considerations, and Best Practices
~ https://www.academia.edu/1052842/National_Volunteer_Fire_Cou...
Firefighter Arson Prevention & Recovery Toolkit - NVFC
~ https://www.academia.edu/3258256/Firefighter_Arson_Preventio...
> the number of arsonists is 0.0001% of the general population. The number of firefighters that are arsonists (100/65,795) is 0.0015%, so I suppose it's slightly higher that the general population.
Trying to imagine being really into math and seeing one number that’s fifteen times bigger than another number and posting “that’s slightly higher”
Most guys that go into firefighting really enjoy looking at fire, I can say that much. And this problem exists globally.
Maybe we can also ask why women don't join to fight fires and there's 10% or less participation. Compared to police forces globally there's under 10% female firefighters but around 30% female police officers, so it's not as simple as "it's dangerous and women are afraid".
Computer viruses. Anti-virus companies making viruses happens to be one of my favourite conspiracy theories.
> “There’s roughly 100 firefighter arsonists convicted every year in North America and all of them are serial arsonists, which means three or more fires,”
OK, so why should I care? A brief Google shows the population of North America at ~600 million people. And the number of firefighters in North America at ~1.3 million. So your likelihood of being victimized by a serial firefighter arsonist is about the same as being struck by lightning, dying in a plane crash, or being killed by a falling coconut.
Excellent point. We absolutely should not care that the people we hire to protect are are sometimes convicted of harming us. It's only a few hundred victims a year so we should utterly ignore that it's happening. That traditionally solves all issues.
Now do the stats on police and domestic violence.
Isn't half of Canada on fire right now?