The Tokyo Fire Department (Japanese: 東京消防庁, Hepburn: Tōkyō Shōbōchō) is the fire department of Tokyo Metropolis, Japan. Formed in 1948 during the post-war reorganisation of Japan's government, the TFD is today the largest fire department in Japan by number of firefighters, operating out of their headquarters in the Ōtemachi District of Chiyoda Ward and their 292 fire stations, sub-stations, and branch stations spread across the prefecture. The TFD is often cited as the largest fire department in the world by number of staff, outnumbering comparable departments such as the New York City Fire Department or the Paris Fire Brigade.
In the 2024 financial year, the TFD received 1,095,531 emergency 119 calls, and responded to 4,330 fires (a 9.5% increase on the previous year; 70% of these were building fires), 918,311 calls for emergency medical services, 28,155 technical rescue operations, and 6,418 other calls for assistance, including 2,162 hazardous materials incidents, 1,163 calls to assist police, and 584 animal rescue callouts. The year also saw the TFD process 43,033 building fire safety plan applications and 3,842 submissions related to hazardous materials licensing, as well as delivering 36,360 fire safety inspections and hosting 10,397 fire safety events with over 1 million participants.
Firefighting in Tokyo presents several unique challenges; demand for emergency medical services has been rising rapidly across the metropolis as a result of Japan's aging population, necessitating an increased focus on ambulance provision and the introduction of diversion services, such as consultation hotlines, to ease pressures on emergency medical systems. Climate change has also increased the work of the TFD, as hotter summers have led to an increase in medical emergencies, and more frequent severe weather events increase the demand for rescue work, both within Tokyo and across Japan (where the TFD is often dispatched to support smaller municipal fire departments due to its increased size and capabilities). Finally, the expected threat of a Nankai megathrust earthquake in the near-future necessitates intensive disaster preparedness work and the maintenance of surplus resources and staff to meet the anticipated damage of such an event.
History
The first fire brigades in Edo (the previous name for Tokyo) were known as hikeshi (火消); initially, the first hikeshi were made up of samurai loyal to feudal lords or daimyō, who were required to keep a residence in Edo, but in 1657, the Great Fire of Meireki ripped through Edo destroying 60-70% of the city and killing over 100,000 people, with the local daimyō bikeshi brigades too undermanned, underequipped, and inexperienced to deal with such a large fire. This failure of fire control represented a severe threat to the authority of the ruling military shogunate, and so one year later the jō bikeshi (定火消) was established as a full-time brigade made up of hatamoto samurai directly under the command of the shogun. This brigade was mainly concerned with the protection of the shogun's properties, such as Edo Castle, however did cooperate with the daimyō bikeshi to deal with fires in common areas, so as to not let them spread.
By the time the Meiji era emerged, most firefighting across Tokyo was undertaken by local volunteers in brigades called machi bikeshi, and the number of samurai firefighters had dropped significantly. As a result of reforms in the 1880s following the Meiji restoration, the career fire brigades were absorbed into the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department, whereas the volunteer firefighters were reorganised into groups known as shōbō gumi (消防組) under the control of the governor of the new Tokyo Prefecture.
In 1945, towards the end of the Pacific War, Tokyo was firebombed heavily due to its role as the capital of Japan; the number of casualties from the series of napalm bombing raids is disputed, but most estimates place it around 100,000 deaths.
Following the end of the war, firefighting in Japan was reorganised, creating the modern municipal fire department system; as a result, the Tokyo Fire Department was created in 1948.
In 2019, during the response to Typhoon Hagibis, an elderly woman being rescued died when she fell from a rescue hoist of a TFD helicopter because the rescuers had failed to properly secure her. The two air rescue personnel involved in the incident were officially reprimanded, but were not fired and did not face criminal or civil penalties.
Organisation Fire Headquarters
The TFD's stations are assisted in providing frontline and public-facing services by the fire department headquarters which is responsible for the development of policy and procedure via its departments and divisions:
The TFD is one of the few departments in Japan which directly maintains an aviation unit, as opposed to one being provided by the prefecture. The unit, operating out of two bases in Central and Western Tokyo respectively, commenced operations in 1967 and has primary used French-manufactured firefighting helicopters from Eurocopter and Aérospatiale. The unit delivers multiple competencies, including aerial firefighting against both wildfires and, uniquely, against high-rise building fires, air ambulance services (including a capability to provide a doctor-led Helicopter Emergency Medical Service or HEMS) especially aeromedical evacuation of patients from the Tokyo Islands to the mainland, search and rescue, heavy lifting of rescue equipment to remote areas, and aerial intelligence gathering.
For major disasters, the TFD maintains a Quick Reaction Force (Japanese: 即応対処部隊, Hepburn: Sokuō taisho butai) under its headquarters; the force is designed to provide a rapid response and assessment capability for major disasters such as earthquakes and tsunami, specialising in gaining access to areas made inaccessible by debris, mudslides, or liquefaction. Consisting of an Intelligence Unit to assess the incident ground and a Rescue Unit to perform snatch rescues, the force makes particular use of specialised all-terrain fire appliances, video drones, and watercraft.
Uniquely, the TFD maintains a specialist ambulance group directly under its headquarters, the Mobility Ambulance Task Force (Japanese: 救急機動部隊, Hepburn: Kyūkyū kidō butai) which specialises in the response to mass casualty incidents, patients with highly infectious diseases, bariatric transport, and response to patients who do not speak Japanese. The unit consists of 3 normal high-standard ambulances and 1 negative-pressure ambulance for transporting infectious patients, as well as carrying bariatric stretchers and lifting equipment. The teams are based out of stand-by locations in the community for rapid response; during the day, they are split between Tokyo Station and the residential Setagaya district, whereas at night they are split between the nightlife districts of Roppongi and Shinjuku.
Fire District Headquarters As is typical for Japanese fire departments, the TFD is divided up into several stations, which provide services to a wide area, with subordinate branch stations which are simple emergency response posts in the Western sense; however, the TFD is also the only municipal fire department in Japan to group their stations into formal districts with district headquarters due to the size and heterogeneity of the area covered by the department, which is not found in any other jurisdiction in the country. As is typical, each station is its own self-defined command structure with multiple divisions and sections, including both operational crews and office-based units such as fire prevention, community liaison, and general affairs. Each district headquarters also has Guidance Sections (指導係), Firefighting Equipment Sections (警防装備係), Training Sections (訓練係), and Disaster Prevention Sections (防災係).
The TFD also maintains several Fire Rescue Task Forces (Japanese: 消防救助機動部隊, Hepburn: Shōbō kyūjo kidō butai) nicknamed "Hyper Rescue" directly subordinate to the 2nd, 3rd, 6th, 8th, and 9th district headquarters; formed in 1996 in response to the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake, these task forces are trained and equipped to provide fire and technical rescue at a higher level than the special rescue teams deployed at stations across Tokyo, and as a result are often called to provide support across district lines or outside of the metropolis. Each of the teams, as well as providing general advanced technical rescue, has its own specialty:
2nd Fire Rescue Task Force: This task force, the first to be set up in 1996, is specialised in dealing with post-earthquake conflagrations and heavy urban search and rescue, due to the proportion of pre-war wooden housing stock and heavy industry in its area. It consists of a Mobile Rescue Team, a Mobile Heavy Machinery Team, and a Mobile Ambulance Rescue Team. 3rd Fire Rescue Task Force: This task force, established in 2002 as a result of the Tokyo subway sarin attack and the September 11th attacks, is specialised in responding to CBRN disasters. It consists of a Mobile Science Team for dealing with the agent, a Mobile Rescue Team to recover casualties, and a Mobile Ambulance Rescue Team to decontaminate and treat those affected. 6th Fire Rescue Task Force: This task force is specialised in post-earthquake fire control, heavy rescue and water rescue, due to the wooden housing stock and low-lying geography of its area. Similarly to the 2nd task force, it consists of a Mobile Rescue Team, a Mobile Heavy Machinery Team, and a Mobile Ambulance Rescue Team. 8th Fire Rescue Task Force: This task force, the first to be established in the Tama region, is specialised in both heavy rescue and CBRN response in order to provide both capabilities in the outlying region capable of managing an incident before out-of-area help arrives. It includes a Mobile Rescue Team, a Mobile Heavy Machinery Team, a Mobile Science Team, and a Mobile Ambulance Rescue Team, and is based out out of the Tachikawa Wide-Area Disaster Prevention Base. 9th Fire Rescue Task Force: This task force, the newest of them all having been established in 2016, is specialised in landslide rescue and wildfire suppression, to tackle the unique risk that these disaster pose to the rural Tama region. It includes a Mobile Rescue Team, a Mobile Heavy Machinery Team, and a Mobile Ambulance Rescue Team.
Fire Districts, Stations, and Branches The 1st Fire District Headquarters (Japanese: 第一消防方面本部, Hepburn: Dai-ichi shōbō hōmen honbu), headquartered at Kōjimachi Fire Station, covers the special wards of Chiyoda, Chūō, and Minato in the central Tokyo wards region. The stations in this district cover many of traditional eastern Tokyo's most populous areas, such as the shopping and entertainment districts of Akihabara, Ginza, and Yūrakuchō, as well as several of the capital's most important buildings, such as the National Diet, the Imperial Palace, and Tokyo Station. Fire StationImageAddressSub-StationsBranch StationsMarunouchi Fire Station Japanese: 丸の内消防署
Hepburn: Marunouchi shōbōsho1-3-5, Ōtemachi, Chiyoda-kuNoneYurakucho Branch Station (有楽町出張所)Kōjimachi Fire Station Japanese: 麹町消防署
Hepburn: Kōjimachi shōbōsho1-1-12, Kōjimachi, Chiyoda-kuNoneNagatachō Branch Station (永田町出張所)Kanda Fire Station Japanese: 神田消防署
Hepburn: Kanda shōbōsho4-14-3, Sotokanda, Chiyoda-ku (Sotokanda district forms the majority of Akihabara)NoneKajichō Branch Station (鍛冶町出張所)Kyōbashi Fire Station Japanese: 京橋消防署
Hepburn: Kyōbashi shōbōsho3-14-1, Kyōbashi, Chūō-kuNoneTsukiji Branch Station (築地出張所) Ginza Branch Station (銀座出張所)Nihonbashi Fire Station Japanese: 日本橋消防署
Hepburn: Nihonbashi shōbōsho14-12, Nihonbashi Kabutochō, Chūō-kuNoneHoridome Branch Station (堀留出張所) Ningyōchō Branch Station (人形町出張所)
Hamachō Branch Station (浜町出張所)Rinkō Fire Station Japanese: 臨港消防署
Hepburn: Rinkō shōbōsho5-8-20, Harumi, Chūō-kuNoneTsukishima Branch Station (月島出張所)Shiba Fire Station Japanese: 芝消防署