An otherwise incident-free year in the student area was blighted by a spate of couch fires on Saturday night.
The charred remnants of a dozen couches littered North Dunedin yesterday. The Fire Service attended eight incidents between 8pm on Saturday and 5.30am on Sunday.
Willowbank station officer Mark Dyer said staff were kept busy attending deliberately lit couch fires in Castle St, Clyde St, Leith St North, Harbour Tce and Forth St, after a relatively quite year to date.
"They are definitely behaving better than they have in the past. This has been one of the best years for a long time."
Work by the University of Otago, Campus Watch, police and the Fire Service had helped reduce the number of student-related call-outs this year, he said.
Couch fires were nothing more than "nuisance calls" for the Fire Service, but had the potential to take resources away from attending house fires or motor vehicle accidents.
"There is no real safety issues involved unless the kids get themselves burnt. Sometimes they aren't too clever where they put their couches, such as up against a building where there is a risk of tragedy."
Students used to light couches in the back of their flats, but began lighting them on the street after being fined by the Otago Regional Council, Mr Dyer said.
An average couch fire equates to burning 10 to 20 litres of petrol, he said.
"They do burn very, very hot ... but don't take too much to put out."
