Climate, Fire Strike Delicate Balance To Reduce High Fire Risk

PALO ALTO, CA -- Suggesting Californians go outside and rake up leaves to prevent wildfire's impacts as U.S. President Donald Trump did when he toured the devastation in Paradise equates to looking out the window to gauge climate.

The climate and its relationship with wildfires that now ignite and mow down communities bring about a seldom-understood debate about how to avert these blazes. The reality is: You don't completely. That's why climate and forest management experts insist on a practical, on-the-ground approach to this convoluted issue that can mean the difference between someone living or dying or whether their house remains standing. At least 85 people are known to have lost their lives in the Camp Fire -- a figure that represents the deadliest in California history and overwhelms other blazes. It's more than three times the number of the Tubbs Fire last year in Sonoma County.

"One thing is for sure, the way fire behaves on a local scale is very complicated. Local actions like creating defensible space around homes has been shown to be highly effective, but other actions to manage fire are important as well," Stanford research fellow Benjamin Bryant said.

Along with other experts, Bryant makes several points that have led California up to the crescendo of the deadliest, most destructive fire in the state's history.

First, California is bone dry. The National Weather Service reports the San Francisco Bay Area has gone 50 days without precipitation. When even the slightest spark hits oil-rich fuels like madrone and manzanita or easy-to-light grasses, it can ignite a fiery blaze that carries like a blow-torch flame when it's wind whipped.

And it's warm -- warmer than usual. Temperatures in recent years have not only risen during the day. They're hotter at night. In terms of fire behavior, activity calms when the state experiences cool nights. It's as though the conditions have no time to recover when it doesn't cool down.

There's no denying the effects of climate change. Three of our warmest years on record have been in the last three years, according to the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration. Visit https://www.noaa.gov/news/noaa-2017-was-3rd-warmest-year-on-record-for-globe.

Take an electrical line, blowing ember or a cigarette butt to a tinderbox full of fuel when it's warm around the clock, and the prescription for devastating wildfire is there.

This is why Cal Fire doesn't use the term "fire season" anymore. Strike teams from the Bay Area have responded to wildland fires around Christmas -- wearing Santa hats to cheer themselves up.

"Climate affects whether things catch on fire," Bryant said in a remedial way. "We just have to create a fire-resilient landscape, and we have to get our climate under control."

Cal Fire has rated 188 communities at "very high fire hazard severity zones," according to Stanford wildfire management academic specialist Rebecca Miller. Among them in Santa Clara County are

• Los Gatos
• Saratoga
• Cupertino
• Monte Sereno
• San Jose
• In San Mateo County, the hazardous communities include:
• Belmont
• Half Moon Bay
• Hillsborough
• Portola Valley
• Redwood City
• San Carlos
• San Mateo
• Woodside

Visit http://www.fire.ca.gov/fire_prevention/fire_prevention_wildland_zones_maps.

These zones are determined based on a model that considers underlying local characteristics that affect fire behavior. Cal Fire defines hazard and risk differently. Hazard reflects factors such as fuel, slope and weather, whereas risk incorporates mitigating actions. It's like putting a fire hydrant in a neighborhood.

Fending off this wildfire commands thwarting the tons of polluting emissions in the air to move toward more of a carbon- and methane free energy transportation system. But this solution, like many others, takes money and desire -- so Californians won't continue to live in "the new abnormal" as California Gov. Brown put it.

Second, the federal government that is supposed to manage what amounts to 15 times the acreage of the state's land in the Butte County fire zone is stretched way too thin to clear out the brush, ladder fuels and trees where wildfires can crown. One could argue it's the cart-in-front-of-the-horse affect in which federal fire agencies are forced to spend most of their time and money on fighting fire instead of preventing it.

"They're spending more fighting the fires than they are mitigating them because they're forced to," Bryant said. "It would help if the Forest Service had a greater budget for restoration."

Case in point, slash piles have mounted in the forest all over the Sierra Nevada mountains. With a record 129 million dead and dying trees, it's difficult to keep up. A new study released a year ago by a working group assigned by the California Resources Agency took a collective swipe at how to take care of the problem. Gov. Brown signed off on Senate Bill 859, which dedicates $900 million in climate control measures.

"It's going to take a big injection," Bryant said. "But we have to be pro-active."

Thirdly, fighting the problem is going to take a meticulous plan that goes way beyond raking up, clearing out eves and gutters, applying the 100-foot buffer from the homes or simply clear cutting. With these types of firestorms, embers blow miles ahead.

Menlo Park Fire Chief Harold Schapelhouman urges Californians to rethink the materials used in construction. The chief, as part of the San Mateo strike team responding to the Camp Fire efforts, would like to see more non-combustible products utilized in buildings such as steel, aluminum and concrete. Wood is not a defense with these types of infernos.

He contends the use of wood products without the phasing in of fire safety suppression measures or use of other high-quality, fire-resistant materials is "irresponsible" making homeowners in fire's path "highly vulnerable." More than 18,000 structures -- mostly homes -- burned down in the Butte County inferno that's also the most destructive in California history. More than 5,000 are still threatened almost two weeks later.

"There are better ways to build these important projects, so they don't burn down," he said.

To prove it, the fire protection district is modernizing a fire-resilient station 6 in downtown Menlo Park on Oak Grove Avenue, with construction to be completed by the end of the year.

If local communities adopt the very high fire hazard severity zone maps that Cal Fire has developed and recommended, the action triggers the adoption of specific wildfire-resistant building codes - Chapter 7A of the California Building Code. New construction and major retrofits within very high fire hazard severity zones in that community would be implemented. Buildings outside the very high fire hazard severity zone don’t have to meet these wildfire-resistant building codes unless local jurisdictions decide to include them.

More information on the building codes can be found at http://www.fire.ca.gov/fire_prevention/downloads/

Building on our defense

Nic Enstice, a regional science coordinator with the Sierra Nevada Conservancy, called the Camp Fire behavior as well as that of the blazes in the Wine Country the year before as "extraordinary events" demonstrating the extreme nature of what happens when the 33 million acres in California become increasingly unhealthy.

"Hopefully, we have the opportunity to learn from this," Enstice said. "Yes, climate change makes things worse. But we have the information that says we can do something about what we're seeing. The first order of business is we need to be comfortable that fire exists."

One critical juncture involves becoming smarter and letting the science be the guide.

When a forest is treated by reducing the amount of underbrush and ladder fuels built up below the canopy, the vegetation no longer sucks up water. In some parts of the state, the collected water can make the remaining trees more resilient. In other areas, that saved water may end up percolating through the soil and into the rivers.

Plus, like many things in life, moderation makes for a better future for all living things. When a forest is treated and the underbrush has been taken out, the amount of water that stays in the ladder fuels diminishes. These small trees will normally suck up the water. When they're gone, the water has nowhere to go but in the soil. And now, that affects a water supply where it normally would be trapped in the forest where it serves as a lubricant of sorts.

Then, there are other concerns with the approaching rainstorms this week.

The stormwater runoff flows quickly down hill without the growth serving as a means of erosion control. Flash floods become a bigger issue following a devastating fire.

"We need to get the forests back to a healthier state. This is what we forecasted with the need for forest restoration because this was the risk," Enstice said. "Our hearts go out to the folks of Magalia and Paradise."

See also

• K9 Back On Job At Camp Fire After Injury, Surgery
• When Loss Hits Home: Menlo Park Fire Chief Homestead Destroyed

--Images courtesy of San Mateo County strike team