Crews of union firefighters from Roslyn, Lookout Point, Willowbank, St Kilda and Dunedin City stations gathered to picket outside the Dunedin City Station yesterday.
Mosgiel Station held a separate rally.
They joined firefighters across New Zealand seeking better pay, conditions and equipment.
New Zealand Professional Firefighters Union (NZPFU) Dunedin secretary and firefighter Mike Taylor said the walk-off was a "last resort".
"We want Fenz [Fire and Emergency New Zealand] to come to the table and discuss pretty important health and safety issues that are affecting the brigade.
"We've got fleet that regularly breaks down on their way to emergencies, we've got a big gap in our training for our firefighters. Fenz refuses to recognise occupational cancer in our firefighters, plus we’re fighting for pay and working conditions."
In August, NZPFU started nationwide industrial action after negotiations for a collective agreement failed.
After more failed discussions, Mr Taylor said walking off the job yesterday was the final option.
Next Thursday, multiple essential service industries will be going on strike — more than 100,000 people nationally are estimated to be taking part.
"There seems to be a lot of feeling across all our support services at the moment ... that things aren't tracking quite the way that they should be at the moment, I think we'll be seeing more of this."
Next week, NZPFU members would march as support.
Nationally, Fenz received calls for 18 incidents during the one-hour industrial action.
Of those, 10 were in areas usually staffed by career firefighters.
Three were car crashes, and the remainder were all related to building alarms.
Fenz deputy national commander Megan Stiffler
said she was "disappointed" NZPFU had issued a further one-hour strike notice for October 31, and she urged them to withdraw it.
"This is in the best interests of our people, and New Zealand’s communities."
