Cities can’t be made fireproof, but they can be made fire-resilient

As deadly wildfires continue to burn in Southern California, over 1,000 structures have been destroyed. Although a number of factors have contributed to the conflagration, including the dry, powerful Santa Ana winds, urban design has played a role in its impact.

“When we get into these urban areas, it’s structure to structure to structure,” said Roy Wright, CEO of the Insurance Institute for Business & Home Safety. “And the fire is just going to move through the entire block.”

The IBHS has researched home wildfire resilience and even modeled what happens when a home catches fire. “Marketplace” host Amy Scott spoke with Wright about what the institute has learned about wildfire risk in urban areas and what neighborhoods can do to improve their resilience. The following is an edited transcript of their conversation.

Amy Scott: So Roy, you and I first met a few years ago, when you were actually testing some fire safety measures in buildings, and here we have an example of an urban fire with buildings close together. Can you talk about what you’ve learned about how that contributes to the spread of wildfires?

Roy Wright: When you joined us, we went and looked at what it looks like when the fire moves from structure to structure, and that’s the exact phenomenon that we were watching. And we know that what’s closest to the building matters, because when embers pick up and fly and they land, they’re looking for something to ignite. You land on a sidewalk, you’re going to fizzle out. You land in a hedge or a tree or a bush, you’re likely going to ignite. And often, when those are right next to buildings, you can fully envelop it. Once it’s fully enveloped, it is casting off embers that, again, might fly a half-mile away, but they’re also putting direct heat and fire on the structures next door.

Scott: How does the urban nature of these fires complicate the effort to both fight them and also evacuate people?

Wright: There is no question that the more people you have concentrated in an area, the harder it is to make evacuations succeed quickly, as well as how much more fuel there is to keep propagating, advancing that fire. If you’re in a more rural area, there could be 30 feet, 100 feet, even 500 feet to the next home. But when we get into these urban areas, it’s structure to structure to structure to structure, and the fire is just going to move through the entire block unless the firefighters are able to get to you.

Scott: So a lot of folks outside of California are watching this and probably thinking about, could it happen here? Do you expect these kinds of urban wildfires to increase due to climate change?

Wright: Simply yes, we are seeing this. We saw this in Lahaina, Hawaii. We’ve watched this outside of Denver. We’ve seen this in New Mexico, in Oregon, throughout the West, but not just there. Frankly, we’ve seen these in Gatlinburg, Tennessee. The nature of very dry land, high hot winds, that combination just puts fire on an accelerator to move through a community.

Scott: What have you learned about what homeowners can do and what communities can do to prepare for and mitigate the effects of this kind of wildfire?

Wright: We cannot eliminate wildfire. Ignitions are going to happen, and fire has been part of an ecosystem for thousands of years. We can narrow its impact. We can make homes more survivable. It plays really two sides of an equation. Have you created a defensible space and ensured that when embers land, your building cannot ignite? That’s about your fences. That’s about your bushes. The second piece that is, frankly, even harder, is you have to take actions across the entire neighborhood because even if you did everything perfectly, if your neighbor didn’t, they can be the source of ignition that begins the cascade. You’ve got to make sure that that is cleared, and we’ve got to find a way so that when embers do invade a community, they don’t have a way to propagate and advance.

Scott: We should talk about insurance. Your institute is funded by the insurance industry, am I right?

Wright: We are, yeah.

Scott: And many people in California and elsewhere have been struggling to get affordable homeowners insurance because of the increase of hazards like this and the increased cost of replacement. How vulnerable does that leave folks in the areas that are burning?

Wright: You know, I think there’ll always be regulatory actions in the immediate aftermath of a fire to protect consumers, as they should. California has been taking actions to address their marketplace. Commissioner Ricardo Lara has taken some very important actions in recent months, but frankly, no regulatory action is going to change the extreme wildfire risk. The only way to do that is to change the profile of our neighborhoods, and now we have to have that kind of risk insurance meet the reduction of risk. And honestly, what’s going to make your home more survivable will also give you an enduring path to home insurability.