thinking of anyone here in SoCal

I'm safe and sound 400 miles north here in the San Francisco Bay Area. Sadly, those types of fires happen in the south with shocking frequency.

I can see smoke from the mt. fires in the san bernardino mts. In the high desert here we are safe though. SIL has been evacuated from her house in Poway. It was rebuilt after the fires took it in '03. Humidity was 3% with up to over 80 mph winds. That downs power lines, starts fires. It is like a storm. Firebugs come out of the woodwork. Natural causes are always there too.

There are so many people here they build in areas that really are not good to live in. People keep coming, developments keep being built. It is really a sad thing.

Fires have always been here, the difference is lives and property now. Everyone locally knows someone who has been touched someway.

Thanks to everyone for thinking of us and sending thoughts and prayers.

Taria

Mel> cycjec wrote:

And each time those fires are shown on the TV (which seems to be every Northern Hemisphere summer) I'm always amazed that there are so many Australian Eucalypts planted in California. Given our experiences with those blasted trees, I can't understand why anyone in warm, dry climate plants them.

That and wooden houses. I know it is an earthquake zone, but modern reinforced concrete is good stuff and it is absolutely heartbreaking to see the only thing left standing is the fireplace wall.

I hope the winds die down and the temperatures drop back to normal to give everyone a chance of getting these d*** fires under control.

Lizzy

prayers to all our Cali sisters. Hope the fires burn out or put out soon. amy in CNY (where it rains everyother day....)

So what do you do with the zillions of houses already built? I have seen a couple of houses built in fire areas of concrete. The risk of earthquakes and I would imagine costs are prohibitive. My sil lost her house 4 years ago in the big SD fire. The rebuilt house was done to all the new fire codes. 2 days ago the fire came to the back door but the house did not burn. Both of her houses were built with stucco. It doesn't burn. There are just too many people here in places they shouldn't be. Fire codes are pretty strict for new construction but there are just a lot of people and houses already here. I'd rather risk losing my house to fire than dying in it during an earthquake. Fire usually allows evacuation. No warning on earthquakes.

I can only guess that Eucs are planted because they grow well with little water in this climate. WHen I was a kid there were rows of them along the citrus and avocado groves as windbreaks. It worked but the groves have been taken out and housing tracts planted in their place. Some of the lines of eucs remain. There is a area in Orange County that the railroad planted completely with a eucalyptus forest. They were planning to use them for railroad ties and then the nitwits found out the wood would not work. That was in the middle of nowhere at the time but people just keep coming here for the climate and the opportunity. Now there is are probably thousands of houses built among those eucalyptus trees. The biggest problem here is the fires are going into areas that do not typically burn. This wind event was the worst I ever remember. I have lived in So Cal. nearly 50 years and it has followed a really dry couple of years. 3-1/2" of rain in LA last season. Loss of life this go round has been really low. That is something to be thankful for IMO. Taria

Lizzy Taylor wrote:

I think when they planted a lot of them, they had no idea.

And that was probably before the internet was around. Any google hunt would have convinced them that Eucalypts were not a great idea. They grow quick and they recover from being burned but those volatile oils are deadly.

Stucco doesn't burn but the exterior building material isn't necessarily any protection. I've seen lots of brick, mudbrick, concrete block and stucco houses that have been burned to the ground. The fire usually gets in through either windows or external venting of some sort (subfloor, soffits, under roof tiles etc, etc) A few years ago we lost 500 houses in our national capital right in the suburbs about 3 miles from our Federal Parliament building - rather like the burbs of Washinton going up

There are just

Yep. Rotten things in the burbs.

WHen I was a kid there were rows of

:-)) Obvioulsy got the wrong variety. I use old railway ties to edge veg beds with when I can get them. Brillaint as they are as tough as old boots and last forever.

That was in the

Yes. It's those filthy winds that do it. When the houses went up several years ago, my lawn was covered in burned Euc leaves. They'd been wind blown for a very logn way, but they also have a reputation for causing spot fires well ahead of the fire front so I was thankful that they had to been carried so far on the wind before they got here.

Yes. The fires in Greece this year seem to have been particularly bad for loss of life in comparison to the relativley few who have died in this round of fires in California. It would be a horrible way to die.

I thought this might be of interest:

Fire resistant is not fire proof. A quick-moving brush fire is much more survivable than an intense building or thick forest fire. Sort of like a bomb shelter, which may protect you from fallout and flying debris, but will not survive a direct hit.

Fire prevention and maintenance of your home and property to eliminate as much fuel as possible is possible for everyone, and is highly recommended.

There is no sure thing. When I was a kid everyone had wood shake roofs. That has changed but people are slow to change. DS works for the city of SD and was in the fire area as neighborhoods burned. He commented how many houses caught by their wood fencing. How easy that would be to fix. What a shame.

Lots of people involved in evacs. but under 2000 homes burned. Most won't worry about it again until the next big fire. YOu will hear whining when the rains come. In '03 there were quite a few deaths in fire areas due to mud slides. No brush to hold the mountains back. Hopefully people will make changes. It would help if insurers would insist on those.

I live >>

There should be some limits. People building on slopes with a history of slides, in flood zones and on barrier islands, in wooded areas prone to fires.

But I also live in the high desert, and we have brush fires. They're hot and the high winds make them move fast. They aren't as destructive to property, perhaps, but I have known people who inadvertantly went into the fire rather than away from it when their car went into a ditch and they tried to find their way through the smoke. All four, mother, father and two boys, were severely burned. They survived, but at a high cost, and they will always wear the scars. The father's hands had to be fixed in a somewhat useful position, and that's where they remain.

We've had brush fire come within a block of a house we were living in, and with the smoke and the fear that the frame houses would catch fire, it was not something I would want to re-experience. My current house is solid brick. But it, too, would burn given a hot enough fire.

You are lucky not to have the population numbers. There are just too many people here. The house my sil rebuilt after the '03 fires held. It had blocked eaves, sprinklers and all the newer fire proof doodads while being a traditional wood framed house. This fire stopped at her back door and her home is safe. I would never have lived there but that attitude is how I ended up in the desert.

I heard the story from an old gal what a brick build>

You have to choose which risks you are willing to live with. We all have our own particular fears and different areas carry their own historical risks, be they earthquake, fire, flood.....

Hence the fact that most high rise buildings are now built with clever concrete & re-bar systems. The Japanese have taken this on board too. The tallest buildings in the world are now designed the flex with the wind load too. Many of these developments can be and are implemented at a suitable scale and cost for residential building.

I suspect many people simply count on the probability that it won't happen in their lifetime.

Lizzy

This house was built in 1927 and has survived many earthquakes (not real huge ones) without any damage at all. My handyman has had to dig around the house from time to time and says that there is sand all around and under the house, which he says protects the house from shakes. The basement is poured and reinforced concrete, I guess it's like a box set in a bed of sand, so that as the ground shakes, it shifts slightly, and the sand fills in. I don't understand it but something is working very well. That's not to say that if there was a shake like the one that brought down the freeways that there would be no damage.

The house is solid brick, there is no framing in the outside walls at all. There are two courses of brick and the inside walls are simply stuccoed (the texture is different from the interior plaster and lath walls.)

I lived in south Florida for years, and experienced quite a few hurricanes, then moved to California and got shaken and stirred. ;-) Then here, where we get the occasional earthquake and fires. In my youth, I lived in Pennsylvania, where there were occasional tornadoes. Nasty winter storms, too, with really deep snow. I wonder sometimes why now that I am retired, I don't find myself a nice island somewhere - but then I'd get a cyclone or a tsunami, I suppose.

Gee that's most interesting. I hadn't heard of a new system being around.

How does this building system differ from Frank Lloyd Wright's architectural work in Japan in the (I think) ???1920s??? I recall that his name was mud in the US at the time and his work surviving earthquakes in Japan was what saved his bacon in the US and allowed him to go on and do the Guggenheim and Fallingwater etc. I'd thought that Wright's innovative rigid core design that he used in Japan was later used in the West and was still the basis for high rise buildings but obviously I'm out of touch. What's the name of the architect who came up with the current system?

Possibly re-bar was the wrong word. Some buildings have steel frames and the infilling concrete is also re-barred for its own strength. AIUI this eliminates the brick spitting effect (no bricks!) and also stops the concrete from losing its structural strength when it is sheared.

Here is some reading:

- old & new technology here.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seismic_retrofitThe Japanese did a lot of work on this type of thing after the Kobe earthquake. Unfortunately while it is easy to find abstracts of relevant academic papers it is not so easy to see the full paper unless you are searching from inside a university system that has paid up for e-access to journals. Lizzy