The Antiplanner »

Daily Archives: October 25, 2007

Shelter in Place Works! The Real Answer to Fire

By | | Follow up, Wildfire
4 Comments

This morning’s post on fire mentioned “shelter in place,” in which homes are made sufficiently firewise that people can safely remain in the homes during a firestorm. Five neighborhoods in the San Diego area were approved as shelter-in-place communities. The fires touched those neighborhoods, but not a single home was scorched.

Continue reading →

Heck of a Job, Smokey!

By | | Wildfire
2 Comments

A couple of weeks ago, the Secretary of Agriculture proudly gave the Chief of the Forest Service an award for “exemplary leadership and accomplishment in reducing the risk of catastrophic fire to both the wildland and Wildland Urban Interface areas through the U.S. Forest Service Hazardous Fuels Program supporting the President’s Healthy Forests Initiative.”

This award would be pathetic if only because the Secretary gave it to the only agency in the Department of Agriculture that could be considered eligible for such an award. But it is particularly ironic in view of the forest fires that are now burning hundreds of homes in southern California.

Just why does the Forest Service deserve such an award? So far in 2007, more than 8.2 million acres have burned — and counting. That’s is almost twice the average number of acres burned in the last 40 years.

Continue reading →