4 ms·

The wildfire situation in CA was not helped by all those houses so darn close to each other.

catalogia 7y ago
> [In Paradise, California] There were 12,981 housing units at an average density of 708.5 per square mile (273.5/km²) That doesn't seem so unusually dense to me. And the pictures I saw online of the burned houses all have the foundations reasonably far away from each other. These were houses with yards around them, not row homes put right up next to each other. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradise,_California#/media/File:Paradise_after_the_Camp_Fire,_July_2019-7428.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradise,_California#/media/Fi...
deleted 7y ago
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DaveEM 7y ago
Houses close together in an urban environment reduces risk rather than increasing it. For example, Redding Electric Utility (REU) and Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD) did not shut off power to the cities they service while PG&E, which services areas outside each of those cities, did. SMUD talks about urban areas being low risk at https://www.smud.org/en/In-Our-Community/Safety-Tips/Wildfire-safety https://www.smud.org/en/In-Our-Community/Safety-Tips/Wildfir....
hackeraccount 7y ago
I'm not an expert but from the pictures I've seen the problem didn't look to be building next to houses but middle directly next to trees Why didn't people cut back the trees more?
dredmorbius 7y ago
Wildfire risk comes from 1) vast amounts of highly vulnerable and flammable vegetation and 2) blown embers. The fire front isn't leaping house to house. It's being blown, often miles, by fierce, fire-driven and -generated, winds. This is a demonstration of ember-driven ignition: https://youtube.com/watch?v=_Vh4cQdH26g https://youtube.com/watch?v=_Vh4cQdH26g And the phenomenon in the Paradise / Camp Fire: https://youtube.com/watch?v=gxt7L4x_NQo&t=350 https://youtube.com/watch?v=gxt7L4x_NQo&t=350

> [In Paradise, California] There were 12,981 housing units at an average density of 708.5 per square mile (273.5/km²) That doesn't seem so unusually dense to me. And the pictures I saw online of the burned houses all have the foundations reasonably far away from each other. These were houses with yards around them, not row homes put right up next to each other. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradise,_California#/media/File:Paradise_after_the_Camp_Fire,_July_2019-7428.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradise,_California#/media/Fi...

deleted 7y ago

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DaveEM 7y ago

Houses close together in an urban environment reduces risk rather than increasing it. For example, Redding Electric Utility (REU) and Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD) did not shut off power to the cities they service while PG&E, which services areas outside each of those cities, did. SMUD talks about urban areas being low risk at https://www.smud.org/en/In-Our-Community/Safety-Tips/Wildfire-safety https://www.smud.org/en/In-Our-Community/Safety-Tips/Wildfir....

hackeraccount 7y ago

I'm not an expert but from the pictures I've seen the problem didn't look to be building next to houses but middle directly next to trees Why didn't people cut back the trees more?

dredmorbius 7y ago

Wildfire risk comes from 1) vast amounts of highly vulnerable and flammable vegetation and 2) blown embers. The fire front isn't leaping house to house. It's being blown, often miles, by fierce, fire-driven and -generated, winds. This is a demonstration of ember-driven ignition: https://youtube.com/watch?v=_Vh4cQdH26g https://youtube.com/watch?v=_Vh4cQdH26g And the phenomenon in the Paradise / Camp Fire: https://youtube.com/watch?v=gxt7L4x_NQo&t=350 https://youtube.com/watch?v=gxt7L4x_NQo&t=350