With the fires raging across Southern California, we get the usual disaster reactions: sympathy, help, admonitions that we shouldn't live there then, and handwringing about preparations.
California does do a lot of preparations at the state and local level that are invisible during the height of the crisis, especially to the non-local news media. And, of course, there is much that can be and is done by individual homeowners. Not everyone prepares as they should, but every bit of effort makes a difference when the winds rage full of sparks.
In this diary, I'm going to write about some of the preparation steps that I've learned about in my years in California. Not every location has the same rules or the same issues, but knowing the issues and regulations we work with may be helpful even to people elsewhere.
First, some scale and perspective. Yes, a lot of Southern California is on fire, and it is a big crisis. But California, even just Southern California, is enormous. There are plenty of places in Southern California that haven't burned in 100 years. There are people in Southern California completely unaffected this week, other than unusually hazy skies.
There are 58 counties in California; I live in a medium sized one, about the size of the state of Connecticut. We're about 500 miles away from the nearest fire - this time. Our county is quite different from Los Angeles or San Diego, because in our area, we have only 100,000 people, and we have a lot of communites served only by dirt roads, and some nestled in second growth forests. Quite a few communities depend solely on volunteer departments, and some people have no local fire protection at all - these ranchers could be an hour from the nearest staged fire engine.
It took me a long time to recognize one of the key differences between the West and the East - in the West, even though our total rainfall might be similar, we might not have any rain all summer. It took me years of visiting Kentucky before I realized that none of those gorgeous green pastures were irrigated. Even in rainy Northern California, our plants turn dry and brown without irrigation during the 4-6 months of summer. This can lead to dangerously dry conditions even in climates that get substantial annual rainfall. Sometimes especially in climates that get a lot of winter rainfall, because that just creates more brush to dry out during a long, hot summer. We can see dangerous brush fires even in a cool December, when the vegetation has had 6 months of more of warm, dry conditions. Many years, rain is concentrated in January through March. Of course, then there was last winter in Southern California, where the rain did not come at all.
Being fire safe starts with choosing your location. It's not necessary to avoid the West completely to stay safe from fires. Certain locations are always more vulnerable. Fire likes to run uphill. It likes dense second-growth forests and brushy undergrowth. It likes canyons, ridges, and other cataracts in the land that concentrate the wind and send it racing faster. Canyons and ridges have a secondary danger, which is that they tend to have only one road in and out. Don't buy or build a house in these places without a sober assessment of what will happen in a fire. However, once a fire really gets going, if you've got top winds, it hardly matters where you are. I never thought I'd see people evacuating Del Mar, which is relatively flat, largely paved, and right on the water.
The design of your building affects its safety. In New England, shingle style homes are beautiful and appropriate. In California they're a disaster waiting to happen. Most localities, as well as the state as a whole, have strict building codes for fire (as well as earthquake) for new construction. Wooden roofs - an enormous factor in the great Bel-Air fire of 1961 - have been banned for years in new construction. The construction of eaves and soffits has been regulated to incorporate lessons learned from fires. This text was written by the fire department after that fire:
Prevailing structural conditions in the area served in various ways to accelerate the spread of fire. Shingle and shake roofs predominate. Subjected to fire, they ignite readily to destroy the structure beneath. Moreover, these roofs send flaming pieces of wood into the air to drop on other roofs and into the brush, propagating innumerable new fires. Wide picture windows often crumble under the onslaught of the heat and pressure generated in the path of a rampant brush fire. Large, over-hanging, and unprotected eaves furnish a regrettably convenient lodging place for flying embers and super-heated air.
It is manifestly evident that the freedom in structural design permissible in other less hazardous locations in the city does, in specific and predictable ways, augment the fire peril in areas such as Bel Air and Brentwood. Fire protection agencies invariably find extinguishment problems seriously aggravated by many of these architectural invitations to disaster.
It took years, but eventually Californians were willing to accept the regulations that the Fire Departments wanted. Today, the rules are far stricter. In addition to building codes, it's now the law that you must clear 100 feet around any building. That sounds easy enough - but that's an acre of brush - not always easy to clear or keep cleared in terrain (I struggle with it myself). One of the best allies in working on hazardous slopes turns out not to be tractors or weed wackers, but goats. You can hire goats to come work on your hillside, and several larger landowners have started to keep a herd.
For January 1, 2008, CalFire has new fire hazard maps and new fire building codes - anyone building in the high fire danger areas on their map has to conform to new rules. The new codes require - in addition to the older rules governing roofing, soffits, eaves, and the like - non-flammable siding (wood siding is completely out), double-pane windows with tempered glass, and contain new rules for constructing decks (embers under decks cause a lot of structures to catch).
Expect houses with steel roofs, steel siding, and cinderblock or reinforced concrete construction to continue to gain popularity in California. Sunset Magazine's 2007 Idea House, built in the very fire-dangerous area of Truckee, is a very handsome cinderblock timberframe dwelling. Sunset also has an article on fire-safe landscaping this month, including flammable plants to avoid.
My county has a local Fire Safe Council, Fire Safe Mendocino:
The Fire Safe Council does not seek to prevent all wildfires. Instead,it seeks to help those who live in wildland areas prepare to survive the wildfires which are inevitable. The values at stake are the lives of both residents and firefighters, plus animals, homes, and natural resources. Through careful planning and preparation, these losses can be prevented or greatly reduced.
The Mendocino County Fire Safe Council helps this planning and preparation primarily by (1) educating residents about the danger of wildfire and how they can reduce their losses when one occurs, and (2) utilizing grant funding and donations to assist residents in making necessary changes. The most important component of this work is reducing the amount of flammable vegetation close to homes and other items of value, thus reducing their risk of destruction by fire.
To more effectively accomplish these goals, the county-level Council encourages road associations, homeowner groups, subdivisions, neighborhoods, and towns to create their own Fire Safe Councils. The county-wide Council assists local Councils with educational sessions, written materials, guidance, and possible grant funding for vegetation reduction projects in their areas. No legal obligation or connection exists between local Councils and the county Council, except perhaps relative to the use of grant funding.
Our local Council put out one of the best publications I've seen, Living with Wildfire (9 MB PDF). It's specific to our area and its rural and isolated situation, where people do have to fend for themselves or may need to shelter in place, because by the time a fire threatens or is obvious, it may be blocking the only escape route. In addition, there's no practical way to evacuate hundreds of cattle or sheep in an emergency. It covers a lot of planning issues for creating a defensible space and for getting the best possible outcome if a fire comes your way. There are the more obvious ones, like making sure that a fire truck has a place to park, and making sure your house number is visible, to less obvious ones: if you have a large water source (well, pond, tank) and no hydrants nearby, that you could create a fire hose fitting and add signage to make it clearly available to a fire crew, a crew that might not be local and might not be there when you're at home.
There's also a lot to learn about landscaping design - choosing your landscaping so that you can keep it cleared during fire season. They don't want a desert around houses, but they do want carefully chosen plants that can stay moist and that will not ladder fire into your building. The PDF and the CalFire websites have many helpful suggestions. 100' results in a lot of area, and simply mowing/clearing that area will take a lot of time unless low-growing fire-resistant plants are established in that area.
Even if your house is already built, modifications can help. Enclosing eaves makes it harder for a fire to get a foothold into the roof. Small screens on any venting will keep sparks and embers out. Replacing your windows with double-paned tempered glass is good for energy efficiency and for fire. If you have a flammable roof, replace it with fire resistant materials. You might even get a break from your insurance company.
Fire safety requires individual action as well as a strong local government committed to fire protection. If you live in a fire-prone area, remember to keep your property cleared, and that the expense of firefighting aircraft and crews standing idle is money well spent when compared to a conflagration such as we have this week. Even if you cannot accomplish everything on the list, every small thing that we do may make a difference.
Meanwhile, think rainy thoughts for Southern California.