This app is so crucial. Thank you for making it. That said, a fire recently broke out near a family member's house and I didn't even know until I could see the smoke myself, hours later. Apparently my phone had disabled this app due to inactivity. That's no good! Please tell Google to make an exception for emergency services related apps - they should NEVER deactivate due to inactivity!
Reviews for Watch Duty (Wildfire)
← Back to Watch Duty (Wildfire)Love this app but is there a way to toggle the zones on and off? They are handy when a fire is nearby and I want to see evac zones easily but it is really really hard to see streets, neighborhood names and freeways with all the zone lines and names everywhere. It just started defaulting to showing all zones even when zoomed out pretty far.
*paid basic member, 25$/yr* I really appreciate all the volunteers that make this app work. It's hard to rely on local services for accurate and up to date events on social media. This is as good as it gets for now. Definitely recommend but don't rely on this for minute-by-minute reporting. The reality is that volunteers can only do so much and depending on your state and area... they might not have the staff to give prompt updates. Keep expectations realistic.
Super handy app! I live in a heavily forested tourist town where forest fires are a major concern during the summer. This app helps me know what's going on and when to be prepared. Updates are frequent and based on local authorities. Accurate and important information that is easily accessible, cannot go wrong.
Thank you from Los Angeles!!! This app has been a lifesaver. It has everything you need - maps with fire burn area and acreage size, containment levels, evacuation zones, warning zones, wind directions, air quality, frequent news updates, public cameras to see mountain views of the fires, the ability to choose what states/counties to track and then what specific wildfires to track, push notifications with a good alert noise and volume, photos of the fires. I can't praise this app enough!
Must have app especially in California. Incredibly useful user reports on top of official data. I was almost killed in the Malibu fire because this app didn't exist. I can absolutely see it saving lives. My one feature request would be if I could be notified if one of my pinned locations has a power outage.
I hadn't used the app in a while. I renewed my annual membership & reinstalled it on my phone. I was sorely disappointed to discover that the app has been "updated" so you can only put in specific addresses to monitor. If you enter a city, the app picks an arbitrary point in the center of the city. It does not show the boundary lines of the city, so you may as well enter a specific address. The option to select counties is no longer available, which renders the app useless for my purposes.
THE BEST A total life saver! Such an awesome app. I was desperately looking for an information on a wildfire that's within 20 miles of our house... In my searching I found a few apps including really expensive apps. This was the only one that actually had any real information... It's actually non profit and will work 💯 free. You can also pay $25 or a year for a basic membership that adds a little or donate so it can keep it's bills paid or pay around $100 for the app for the professionals
We live in a remote location prone to summer wildfires, as I'm sure many users of the app do. Was very useful last year, even showed a couple small fires started by lightning strikes a few miles away which were not mentioned anywhere else as far as I could find. No other resource I've seen is as comprehensive.
Definitely has great coverage. Unfortunately, if you live in one of the largest Counties, you are forced to either get notifications for the entire County or get none. Los Angeles County covers far too much geography for such level of notifications to be practical. It's ironic that the County is based on the GPS location and yet this app can't be bothered to use the GPS location to make alerts more helpful. If I can get less notifications from 100+ miles south of my location is give 5 stars.
EXCELLENT. They have done a great job on this app. The membership is well worth the price. It has it all: Besides the (excellent) map, there is flight tracker (location of helicopters and fire planes in real time), wind speed and direction and the fire cameras. We were on an evacuation warning for the past 2 days and I was able to tell exactly what was going on. Thankfully, we are safe. Thank you!!
Fabulous tracking information and adding features all the time like shelters, links, etc. Very helpful during the Altadena fires. Best part is everyone can see what's happening with loved ones near and far. It's a free app... I just purchased the yearly membership. Please give to help keep it free for everyone, even if it's just $1.00.
Absolutely invaluable app for fire-prone California residents. Simple, easy to use and navigate, far more useful than CalFire's website, which I find slow. My only wish is that I could follow more counties. I believe the limit is 4 or 6, for all alerts from that particular county, and I'd like to see unlimited as I have family in multiple counties that I'd like all alerts for. Other than that, I have no complaints. I've never experienced any technical issues. This is app is excellent!!
Was a great app until it started crashing on me. I even paid the $25 to be able to save multiple locations, but now every time I open it it crashes in seconds, even though I've uninstalled and reinstalled it multiple times. At first that helped but now it does not. :( What set off the crashing was tuning on the lawyers, but now it won't stay open long enough for me to turn them off.
This app helped me monitor the fire conditions and pop-up wildfires while on vacation allowing my family to be thoughtful about our travel plans. One note to fellow travelers, if you're out of range of cellular service or wifi, the app is unable to alert you, so keep that in mind in remote locations. Still an excellent app that I'll plan to use whenever I'm traveling in the coverage area.
It's a good app to have for sure, my only wish is that I could set the area by address & be able to choose how many miles away I want to start getting alerts for. Also if you could choose what you would like to be alerted for that would be great. As it is now you can only set if for the whole county & I'm forever constantly getting alerts for things all the way across the county which makes me want to turn it off.
Very helpful. It would be nice if you can set it to only notify you of fires within a certain mile range. Otherwise you'll be getting unnecessary tiny heart attacks all day every day if you live in a large county. I do not necessarily want to manually turn off notifications for every fire that is far away, on the chance that it grows so large that it actually come close.
I'm in the building stages of my home, so there is, as of yet, no actual address to input. With this app I was able to enter my Block and Lot Numbers to receive notifications for when fires are in the vicinity. I do wish their fire maps were a little more detailed when it comes to unpaved county roads, so that I may get a better idea of how far away the fires are, but I'm sure that will come with time. Great app otherwise and I highly recommend it for people who live in rural areas.
I live in a town surrounded by fire country. This app is the best for getting updates quickly. I always check it during fire season before I go anywhere. Most of the areas I love to hike and fish in are very prone to fires, so this app is vital to make sure there are no issues before I leave on a trip. Also love the flight tracker option, so I can stay away from the areas the fire units are using for water dips.
The constant notifications outside my selected areas are annoying. This app is crucial for safety and that the most important specs require pro purchase is disgusting everyone has to make a buck even at the expense of everyone's safety. I hate that the street view doesn't show all streets or cities is frustrating. I haven't found a replacement app yet so this is better than nothing for now.