AST August 2018 Magazine Aug 2018 Final (8.14.18) | Page 55

Volume 26
Kurt Henke, former chief of the Sacramento Metro Fire
Protection District
New homes there are safer, but they’re also
far grander.
And complacency has settled in, with dan-
gerous brush accumulating.
“When you’re more remote from the core
August 2018 Edition
resources, we have a very tough time provid-
ing efficient and effective fire support in a
timely manner,” said Henke, who works with a
coalition of major fire departments to create a
statewide network that deploys firefighters in
advance of big fires.
When homes and lives are at risk, the
costs of suppression surge. Last year, Cal-
Fire’s fire-fighting costs marked an eight-
fold increase since the 1990s.
And damages are greater. Napa and Sonoma are
estimated to have suffered more than $8 billion
in insured losses in the 2017 fires — the costliest
wildfire disaster in California’s recorded history.
Five decades ago, the footprint of Sonoma County’s
1964 Hanley Fire mirrored last year’s Tubbs Fire, said
Keeley.
Far-flung homes create a special chal-
lenge for fire fighters, said Kurt Henke,
former chief of the Sacramento Metro But nobody died and only 84 structures were
destroyed. In contrast, the Tubbs Fire killed 22
Fire Protection District.
If a fire breaks out in the kitchen of a down-
town home, an entire firefighting force can
be on the scene within six to seven min-
utes, he said.
people and incinerated more than 5,643 struc-
tures.
Jon Keeley, a senior fire scientist with the U.S. Geological
Survey’s Western Ecological Research Center
But it takes much longer – from 15 min-
utes to an hour, maybe more – to assem-
ble the team of engines, bulldozers and
air support needed to fend off a raging
wildfire that threatens a subdivision on a
rural edge of a city, he said.
It may take hours for more distant
fire departments to arrive.
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