Go behind the scenes of a 911 dispatch center.

See how a 2018 fire in Paradise, California, exposed the limits of emergency coordination

This Frontline documentary shows how the Camp Fire stretched and ultimately overwhelmed the complex web of agencies involved in emergency response, including fire suppression, 911 dispatch, law enforcement, and emergency management, with catastrophic results.

How fighting wildfires works

Firefighters use sophisticated strategies to control wildfires that sometimes cover thousands of acres. This video breaks down how teams set up fire lines to isolate the fires by cutting down brush and trees around the existing fire, among other...

Fire engines are among the most complex vehicles on the road

These vehicles are purpose-built to carry water, foam, hoses, ladders, and lifesaving equipment to a scene in minutes. This animated video pulls apart every system inside a pumper truck, showing exactly how the machinery that fights fires actually works.

A history of raising the alarm, from rattles to 911

Because fires spread so quickly, communities around the world have deployed many tactics to raise the alarm to get help. This history from the Museum of Natural History dives into the use of rattles, bells, and brigades to gather help to fight fires, showing just how far we've come since 911 was introduced in 1968.

Good Samaritans help Florida driver experiencing medical emergency

When a driver experienced a medical episode and was drifting into an intersection, people around her sprang into action and saved everyone on the road from a potentially life-threatening crash.

There are more than a dozen types of different emergency medicine specialties

This video details medical subspecialties in emergency medicine, including medical toxicology, pediatric emergency medicine, undersea and hyperbaric medicine, hospice medicine, and more. It discusses where these types of specialists may work, including beyond a hospital setting.

Volunteer fire departments are declining as communities shift to career staff

As populations increase and emergency calls grow more complicated, many communities are replacing volunteer fire departments with full-time professional staff—a change that boosts response capacity and reliability but also significantly raises costs.

Read what it's like working in emergency medicine

A board-certified emergency medicine physician working in the Bronx writes about what her workweeks look like and what attracted her to this fast-paced medical specialty, including being able to help suffering patients quickly, treating a wide range of ailments, and tending to disadvantaged communities.

Track active wildfires, floods, and other natural disasters across the US in real-time with this interactive map.

They lost loved ones on 9/11. Hear the heart-wrenching voicemails they'd leave for them.

NPR set up an old phone booth in Brooklyn Bridge Park — across the river from the new World Trade Center — and invited people to leave a voicemail for someone they lost that day.

See how CES comes to life with a massive setup across Las Vegas

This behind-the-scenes video shows crews assembling the sprawling CES show—filling more than 2.5 million square feet of exhibition space with booths, lights, and tech from around the world ahead of the event’s opening.

Hear the story of the first paramedic services, which grew out of a community training program in 1960s Pittsburgh.

Deputy sheriffs and city police have different legal authority and chains of command

Sheriffs are elected officials at the county level, and their deputies usually patrol unincorporated areas and manage county jails. City police are hired by local government authorities and operate within city limits under a different chain of command.

America's first trained EMT service was established in Pittsburgh's inner city

Watch this documentary about the Freedom House Ambulance Service—the foundation for all paramedic training in America. Founded in 1967, this emergency care force composed of Black men and women from Pittsburgh sought to respond to Pittsburgh's Black community emergencies when the Black community couldn't rely on the police and fire departments to consistently respond to their emergency calls.

Reporting on the Santa Cruz storms

The Pulitzer on the Road podcast interviews prizewinners for insights on their work and takes a deep dive into issues relevant to the awards. This episode focuses on Lookout Santa Cruz, a digital California-based outlet that won the Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News for its coverage of the devastating storms the region faced in early 2023. Lookout’s reporters discuss the importance of local news coverage.

A look behind the scenes of the UN General Assembly

This behind-the-scenes look at the 2015 UN General Assembly offers a unique perspective on what it takes to run one of the world’s most complicated and important diplomatic events. Following four staffers—including a youth advocate and an interpreter—the video captures the energy, pressure, and coordination behind the scenes.

Most US fire departments are staffed entirely by volunteers, though they tend to serve smaller communities

According to the Federal Emergency Management Agency's 2024 registry, 70% of US fire departments are all volunteer, while 9.5% are fully staffed with paid employees. Volunteer departments are mainly found in rural and suburban areas, whereas most urban Americans are served by career or mixed departments.

Watch a video about how cellphones conquered the world

A fight with a telecom giant. A stunt call on a New York sidewalk. A forgotten memo that rewired the world. Host Sony Kassam sits down with Marty Cooper, the father of the cellphone, and Arlene Harris, the first lady of wireless, to explore the innovation, politics, and high-stakes battles that pried connectivity out of corporate control, unlocked the airwaves, and built the always-on world we live in today, for better or for worse.

Park rangers discuss what it's like where two deserts meet

In this 29-minute podcast, two park rangers at Joshua Tree National Park sit down with Dr. Cameron Barrows from the University of California-Riverside to understand what exactly it means for two deserts to meet. Slightly bigger than the state of...

Some California cities outsource their public services entirely to the county

Southern California's "contract cities" incorporate as municipalities but pay Los Angeles County for police, fire, and other services rather than running their own departments—a cost-saving model common across the region.

Explore a typical layout of an emergency department

This architectural diagram illustrates the layout of an emergency area. It provides insights into a typical emergency room organizational system to provide context for patients as they flow from entry through triage into treatment.

The horror hotlines of the 1990s

Before the internet, 900-number hotlines were the way to retrieve instant information over the phone, whether for weather reports, movie information, or spooky horror stories. Callers could dial the number and hear ghost stories, experience interactive horrors, and more. This article reminisces about this extinct technology and how it paved the way for the internet.

Rural emergency rooms are sometimes operating without any physicians on-site

These facilities may not have an on-site doctor at all, with norms varying widely by state. In North and South Dakota, more than half of their emergency departments were running without 24/7 attending physician staffing, according to recent research. Instead, they're staffed by physician assistants and nurses.

Listen to a weekly podcast about the people behind local government

The "GovLove" podcast features interviews with mayors, city managers, planners, and public servants at every level. It covers policies, challenges, and the daily realities of running local government across the US.

Take a 360-degree tour of a Google data center

In the 1960s, Virginia became home to the first emergency department in the US.

Go behind the scenes of Air Force One

ABC News takes viewers inside Air Force One, revealing how the president's plane operates as a secure command center in the sky. Explore the logistics and coordination that go into every presidential flight.

View the layout and components that make up a typical data center

Alongside server rooms for the storage, processing, and transmission of data, data centers include climate control systems to manage the heat generated by microchips, backup systems to ensure systems can run during power outages, offices for on-site personnel, and monitoring and security stations to provide continuous protection against physical threats.

Snowfall records from every county in the US

Discover the one-day snowfall records of every county in the US in this comprehensive map. Data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration captures inches of snowfall and the year it fell the most in each county. See the contrasts between the inches of snowfall in warm southern American states and the cooler East Coast.

Fire districts and fire departments are governed differently

A fire department is usually a municipal agency under the control of city or county authorities. In contrast, a fire district functions as an independent special district with its own elected board, separate budget, and taxing authority.

Explore how global teams coordinated by the UN's International Search and Rescue Advisory Group find and rescue survivors of large-scale earthquakes, from preliminary surveys to recovering bodies.

Teen rides stranded scared horse to safety—14 miles out of burning canyon

When wildfires tore through the Los Angeles area in 2025, resulting in one of the worst natural disasters on record, one 16-year-old equestrian named Kalyna Fedorowycz bravely rescued an animal. She saw a horse named Sovereignty in the evacuation zone of the still-raging Palisades Fire, and led and rode him for 14 miles to safety. Sovereignty was eventually reunited with his owner.

Breaking down how and why 5G will change the world

The jump from 3G to 4G networks was pretty huge, and 4G to 5G is many times greater and is almost difficult to comprehend. This nine-minute video dives into how 5G will transform our world.

In 1974, Los Angeles’s Community Analysis Bureau built a smart city

Los Angeles utilized aerial imaging and cluster analysis to gather and interpret civic data, leveraging surveillance technologies developed by the Department of Defense during the height of the Cold War. Instead of being used for military purposes, data insights helped direct social services to high-poverty neighborhoods.

View data center electrical demand and fiber optic cable connections across the US

Data center hub construction has prioritized locations with affordable electricity and fiber internet for data transmission, including Loudoun and Prince William Counties in Virginia and Maricopa County in Arizona. As of 2025, Northern Virginia's robust data center infrastructure is estimated to handle about 70% of global internet traffic.

View a map of US data center infrastructure in 2025

Thousands of data centers across the country have already been built, with more under construction or planned. Facilities are connected via transmission and fiber optic lines, with the latter spanning an estimated length of 160 million miles.

See Virginia's emergency stats broken down by date, type, and even body part

This dashboard from Virginia's health department provides a detailed look at various aspects of its emergency care services from January 2019 to December 2024, when there were more than 575,000 emergency incidents. More than 40% of its emergency services were devoted to slips and falls.

Manage the control room of a virtual nuclear power plant

This interactive takes you on a tour of a virtual plant before handing you the keys to the control room. Challenge yourself to produce enough energy to meet demand while avoiding a nuclear meltdown.