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Yes, wildfires get incredibly hot. But the fires essentially always travel by embers or direct contact with fire - your comments about IR radiation seem to impl
by hn_throwaway_99 2y ago
Yes, wildfires get incredibly hot. But the fires essentially always travel by embers or direct contact with fire - your comments about IR radiation seem to imply that IR alone will cause ignition, which is rarely if ever the case.
Here is a story about a bunch of people who survived the Camp fire in Paradise, CA, surrounded by the raging inferno, by staying in the middle of a parking lot: https://www.firehouse.com/operations-training/wildland/news/21034768/over-hundred-people-survive-camp-fire-paradise-ca-parking-lot-firefighters https://www.firehouse.com/operations-training/wildland/news/...
- PaulDavisThe1st 2y agoIt is rarely the case, indeed. However, in incidents like e.g. the Fort McMurray fire (Alberta, 2016), this is precisely what happens. One property with a heavy fuel load fanned by strong winds (i.e. plentiful O2 supply) gets hot enough that it causes ignition in a neighboring exposure. In Ft. McMurray, there were documented cases of an entire 4+ bedroom house being reduced to ash in roughly 5 minutes. The heat generated by that process is easily sufficient to cause ignition in buildings <typical suburban layout> apart.
- hn_throwaway_99 2y agoEven in that case I'm sure a huge part of the heat transfer is convection, especially with the high winds. Comment I was replying to was talking about IR igniting things by shining through windows, which I believe is mostly bullshit.