Hacker News Reader

Comment by taf2 | Hacker News Reader

I recall growing up in Santa Cruz mountains and when a neighbor had a tree fall and crash through half his house during a storm with his whole family there that night… afterwards he removed a few of the other dead trees around his house that could potentially fall on the house as well - cut down… many in the neighborhood flew black flags on the mailboxes and protested him having the dead trees removed… I always loved the nature living there and at time being young it felt like he was the evil rain forest tree cutter … now in my 40s I look back and would have done the same thing as him. The fires out there are very scary and I just hope we get it figured out.

View on HN

Before Paradise burned to the ground it was the same way. The city stopped people from cutting down their own trees. Those same trees would fall and kill people. During the time I lived there at least 3 times. 2 in bed one in a truck.

Some people even had trees that were small but just leaning into someone's house, maybe ruining the siding a little.

We should basically cut a 1/2 mile of trees in the semi-urban areas. Leave the 5 or 10 acre properties alone, let them manage their own cruft, but for the "city" part in the WUI, that should be clear-cut with 1/2 mile and maintained yearly. It would create a lot of jobs too. Spend that money on weekly clearing jobs in many areas instead of insurance companies paying that money out to just replace the homes.

There's a movement growing to build effectively a 9' gravel road around Santa Rosa as a fire moat of last defense. It would be paid out of funds given from the recent fire there.

If you zoom in on tiny communities up in the foothills, occasionally you'll see roads marked on google maps as "Dozer Line" where the locals have built their own crude fire moats to protect the community as best they can. I don't know if these are maintained to any degree, but it's certainly not a new idea.

I understand that low masonry walls also prevent heavier wind blown embers from travelling. One on the periphery of your property, and one a few feet from the house. Defense in depth.

I would highlight that given current fire behavior being seen today. A 1/2 mile break might be an okay fire break. But we are regularly seeing crown fires(where the fire runs through the tops of the trees at 30+ mph) that are wind driven with spot fires that are being started 1-5 miles in front of the edge of the fire. These are extreme conditions can only be prevented by keeping the fire down on the ground, with minimal fuel so that the fire doesn’t build up the ground heat that causes the fire to be able to burn through the tops of the trees. Or prevent the fire completely.

This type of fire behavior is nothing new. I’ve been around wildland firefighting since the early 2000s and we were seeing wind driven crown fires during those times every summer. We just called them big fire days and sat back and watched cause there is nothing humans can do to stop a fire with that type of behavior. Other then work nights and hope you can keep it out of the tops of the trees the next day.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com