Miami Safety Guide: Fire Rescue, Disaster Readiness and Storm Zones

The Miami safety section has four deeper guides, on emergency services, flood risk zones, hurricane evacuation zones and sinkhole risk areas, and this hub answers the fire, rescue and disaster questions that lead City of Miami residents to each.

This section covers fire, emergency medical service and disaster readiness; the City of Miami Police Department appears only as a contact. The city runs Fire-Rescue and its Division of Emergency Management (City of Miami DEM), while Miami-Dade County draws the storm surge zones that drive evacuation orders (Miami-Dade storm surge zones).

Last verified: October 18, 2026, on the City of Miami Fire-Rescue, Emergency Management, Police and flood pages, the Miami-Dade County storm surge page and the NOAA Virginia Key gauge page.

Fire and emergency medical calls inside the City of Miami are answered by the City of Miami Department of Fire-Rescue, led by Fire Chief Robert Hevia from headquarters at 1151 NW 7th Street (City of Miami Fire-Rescue).

The department describes itself as an all-hazards fire department, trained for medical emergencies and other incidents beyond fires, and its Health and Emergency Medical Services Division is led by Assistant Fire Chief Christopher Diaz (Fire-Rescue divisions). The main line is 305-416-5400, with (305) 416-1600 as an alternate and [email protected] for email. The Fire Prevention Bureau handles most fire permits, inspections and reports, including standalone fire permits, sub-permits and hydrant flow tests, and a business needing a commercial fire alarm, generator or smoke test outside normal hours can book an after-hours inspection.

Residents can also train. The department's public education division teaches CPR, fire extinguisher use and emergency preparedness, and the Maurice L. Kemp EMS Cadet Program offers free EMT training to at-risk youth ages 18 to 25; the page calls it a six-month program but gives dates of September 2026 to May 2027 for the class whose applications were open July 20 to 24, 2026, or until 150 applicants (City of Miami Fire-Rescue). The Miami emergency services guide sets Fire-Rescue beside the county agencies that also serve the city.

The City of Miami runs 15 numbered fire stations, from Station 1 at 144 NE 5th St in Downtown Miami to Station 15 at 401 Biscayne Blvd at Bayside (City of Miami Fire Stations).

The stations matter on the November 3, 2026 ballot. City voters decide whether to authorize up to $450,000,000 in general obligation bonds to repair and replace critically deteriorating fire and police facilities, including new fire stations and a new public safety headquarters, repaid from property taxes under a debt millage cap (City of Miami bond resolution). The resolution does not list which Miami stations would be rebuilt first, so the station table above is the current network, not a plan.

The City of Miami plans for hurricanes and other disasters through the Fire-Rescue Division of Emergency Management, led by Assistant Fire Chief Grant Musser as the city's Emergency Manager (City of Miami Division of Emergency Management).

DEM coordinates planning, preparedness, response, recovery and mitigation for every city department, manages the Comprehensive Emergency Management Plan (CEMP) and directs activation of the Emergency Operations Center (EOC) (City of Miami DEM). Musser has more than 25 years in Miami Fire-Rescue and served as Lead Operations Task Force Leader during the Surfside building collapse; the city's resource list also names the Urban Search and Rescue Team FL-TF2.

For residents the useful pieces are concrete. Texting ALERTMIAMI to 888777 signs a phone up for citywide emergency alerts, and DEM lists CERT volunteer opportunities among its resources (City of Miami emergency alerts). DEM answers at 305-416-5439 or [email protected] from the 10th floor of the Miami Riverside Center, 444 SW 2nd Avenue. In a hurricane, the Miami-Dade County page says, the county's Emergency Operations Center or Mayor will use local media to relay pertinent information, and residents can register for Miami-Dade Alerts notifications (Miami-Dade County).

A City of Miami address has two separate storm ratings: a Miami-Dade storm surge planning zone, lettered A through E, which drives evacuation, and a FEMA flood zone, which the city Building Department looks up (Miami-Dade storm surge zones).

Miami-Dade defines a surge planning zone as land that could see storm surge of 1 1/2 feet or higher in a hurricane. Zone A faces surge from Category 1 storms and up, Zone B from Category 2 and up, Zone C from Category 3 and up, yet the county may order any zone out based on the storm's track and projected surge rather than its category (Miami-Dade County). Mobile home residents and anyone on electrically dependent life-sustaining equipment are told to leave whenever any evacuation order is issued. The Miami hurricane evacuation zones guide walks through each zone and the shelter steps.

Flood zones are a different map. The city says its coastline, the Miami River and its many canals make nearby property prone to flooding, and its Building Department at 444 S.W. 2nd Avenue, 4th Floor, (305) 416-1111, will say whether a property is in a floodplain (City of Miami flood information). For a $25.00 fee it provides in writing the community number, map panel and suffix, FIRM index date, FIRM zone and base flood elevation, and it keeps elevation certificates for City of Miami buildings constructed or substantially improved since December 1992. The Miami flood risk zones guide covers the FEMA maps in depth.

One stale link is worth knowing. The city flood page still sends readers to the Virginia Key tide gauge at an older water.weather.gov address that did not connect when tested on October 18, 2026; the same gauge, VAKF1, now reports on the NOAA National Water Prediction Service, which lists flood stages above mean higher high water of 1 ft for action, 1.3 ft minor, 1.7 ft moderate and 2.5 ft major (NOAA Virginia Key gauge).

The numbers a City of Miami household should keep for fire, disaster and flood questions are Fire-Rescue at 305-416-5400, Emergency Management at 305-416-5439 and the city's 311 line (City of Miami Fire-Rescue).

The police line is listed here as a contact only: the City of Miami page gives the non-emergency number (305) 579-6111 and headquarters at 400 NW 2nd Avenue in Downtown Miami, and links a Community-Police Mediation Program (City of Miami Police Department). A practical tip: Emergency Management and the Building Department flood desk share the Miami Riverside Center address, 444 SW 2nd Avenue, so a storm plan question and a flood zone letter can be handled on one downtown visit (City of Miami flood information), while Fire-Rescue headquarters is separate, on NW 7th Street (Fire-Rescue).