There’s a great city resource provided by the Seattle Fire Department that lists all of their emergency calls throughout the day in real time. It’s very handy if you hear sirens on your street and want to get an idea of what is going on. You can find the site here.

It shows all the basic info about incidents that they respond to, such as fires, alarms, medical issues, hazmat, etc.

The big issues are easy to spot, as they’ll show up with types like “Assault w/weapons” or “Fire in Building”, and they’ll also have a large number of units respond.

Each unit has a letter and a number. Here’s what the letters mean:
A = Ambulance, usually the American Medical Response vans
M = Medic One Ambulance
E = Fire Engine
L = Fire Ladder truck

Note that often the fire units respond to medical situations, so you’ll see E6 response to a “Medic Response” or “Aid Response” call. And there’s also various rules that determine how many aid units have to be involved, so for a serious situation you might have 4-6 different units involved.

For example, this morning there was a “Medic Response” call to the 1000 block of 23rd Ave, with 2 medic units and 2 engine units responding. It turns out that it was due to a possible stroke, which required a big team to help out.

So if you’re interested, keep an eye on it, and feel free to create a post if there’s a significant event or something you’d like to get more information on.