Company Profile
Loudoun County Fire and Rescue
Company Overview
Our service represents a combined effort of volunteers and career employees responding to emergency incidents 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. We strive to provide the highest level of efficient and professional emergency fire and rescue service to the citizens of Loudoun County and the seven incorporated Towns.
The Loudoun County Combined Fire and Rescue System responded to a total of 27,023 incidents between July 1, 2016 and June 30, 2017 of which 9,596 were fire incidents, 17,135 were EMS and 292 were public service calls.
Company History
The first fire company in Loudoun County was formed on November 13, 1803 in Leesburg, an unincorporated town of about five hundred inhabitants. By petition as entered into the County Deed Books, forty-eight citizens opened the first chapter: "We the subscribers Residents in the Town of Leesburgh do agree (according to Act of Assembly) to form ourselves into a fire company..."
A 1923 fire engine in Purcelville
In Leesburg (and, later, in other communities) a bell was used to indicate alarm. Upon hearing the bell, the citizens would rush to the scene while members of the Fire Company would respond with buckets, hose carts and hand pumpers. The first hand pumper was probably purchased between 1803 and 1809; its earliest documented use was in 1819.
Change in Name
The Leesburg Fire Company changed names several times during its first hundred years. Several years after the Fire Company of Leesburgh was formed, a Relief Fire Company was incorporated, whose purpose was to provide "relief" manpower to the original fire company on large incidents. Other names included the Star, Virginia, Union and Friendship. The arrangement of two fire companies serving the same town continued sporadically through the next century, until the two were combined in 1907 under the name, Leesburg Fire Company. The word "volunteer" was added later.
Growth
Over the years, Loudoun's fire and rescue system has evolved, adopting new technologies and adapting to changing demographics. Today, Loudoun County has more than 1,500 volunteer members and approximately 500 career personnel to answer the calls of fire and rescue emergencies. The combination volunteer and career personnel system staffs more than twenty stations.
Brief History
Each fire and rescue station has an interesting history. That history ranges from community members housing buckets, hose carts, a borrowed milk truck or an abandoned Hurst stored in a driveway to answer a neighbor's call for help due to a fire, or to transport a neighbor to the hospital. To find out more about your local fire and rescue station, please call or visit your station. The men and women who operate these stations are community members like yourself, and are anxious to share their enthusiasm as members of Loudoun's fire and rescue system.