PORTLAND – Maine had only nine fire-related deaths in 2010, a record low, state officials said.

The figure beat the state’s old record low of 12 fire deaths set twice — in 1995 and 2007 — and continued a downward trend that began in the 1980s and has extended into the new century, said Stephen McCausland, spokesman for the Maine Department of Public Safety.

Maine fire deaths averaged about 49 per year in the 1950s, ’60s and ’70s, and 1967 was the worst year with 70 deaths, McCausland said. Records date to 1930.

Maine Fire Marshal John Dean said a number of factors contribute to Maine’s continuing decline in fire deaths: smoke detectors, better firefighter training, modern construction techniques, and an increasing trend toward installation of residential sprinklers.

People are 50 percent more likely to survive a fire if there are smoke detectors and 97 percent more likely to survive if sprinklers are installed, Dean said.

“We are having more people install residential sprinklers than we ever thought there would be at this point in history,” Dean said. “People are finding that they’re reasonably priced and they provide their family with a higher level of safety than they’re going to get any other way.”

For homicide deaths in 2010, there was no all-time low. The state saw 24 homicides, including a grisly triple killing in the northern community of Amity, McCausland said. That compares with 26 homicides in 2009, and an average of about 20 deaths per year over the past decade, he said. Detailed records date to 1970.

The year saw a reversal in the trend toward the majority of homicides being domestic-related. Of the 24 homicides, nine were domestic, which is way down, McCausland said.

“That is encouraging,” he said.

It was a relatively safe year on Maine roads. Preliminary figures showed there were 160 highway deaths, which was relatively low but far off the 1959 record of 136. Since 1959, the safest years on the roads were 2008, with 155 highway deaths, and 2009, with 159 deaths. The state began tracking highway deaths in 1950.

The lower number of highway deaths over the past three years reflects a down economy in which people are driving less, as well as stepped-up traffic enforcement, McCausland said. Law enforcement has been using grants to put a greater effort into going after drunken drivers, for example.